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NATURALIST  AT  LARGE 


Photo   b\'    D.   Faircliild 


The  author  and  J.  C.  Greenway,  Jr.,  ^^•ith  a  Bahama  Barn  Owl, 

at  the  mouth  of  a  cave  near  Landrail  Point, 

Crooked  Island,  Bahamas 


y^aturalist  at  Lar^e 


A 


THOMAS  BARBOUR 


ILLUSTRATED 


An  Atlantic  Monthly  Press  Book 

Little,  Brown  and  Company    •    Boston 

1944 


COPYRIGHT    1942,    1943,    BY    PHILLIPS    KETCHUM,    TRUSTEE    UNDER 

AN     INDENTURE    OF    TRUST    MADE     BY    THOMAS    BARBOUR     FOR 

THE     BENEFIT    OF     MARY     B.     KIDDER,     JULIA    A.     BARBOUR 

AND     LOUISA    B.     BARBOUR,    DATED     JULY     I9,     I943 

ALL    RIGHTS    RESERVED,    INCLUDING    THE    RIGHT 

TO    REPRODUCE    THIS    BOOK    OR    PORTIONS 

THEREOF    IN    ANY    FORM 

Published  September  ig4j 
Reprinted  September  1943 

Reprinted  October  194s 
Reprinted  November  1943 

Reprinted  January  1944 


ATLANTIC-LITTLE,    BROWN    BOOKS 

ARE    PUBLISHED    BY 

LITTLE,    BROWN    AND    COMPANY 

IN    ASSOCIATION    WITH 
THE    ATLANTIC    MONTHLY    PRESS 


PRINTED    IN    THE    UNITED    STATES    OF    AMERICA 


Dedicated  to 
ROSAMOND  P.  BARBOUR 

With  great  affection  and  respect 


A  wai-m  salute  to  Edward  Weeks 

and  Dudley  H.  Cloud  for  guiding 

the  clumsy  feet  of  a  tyro 


Peresrlnation  charms  our  senses  with  such 
unspeakable  and  sweet  variety  that  some  count 
him  unhappy  that  never  travelled  —  a  kind  of 
prisoner  —  and  pity  his  case;  that  from  his 
cradle  to  his  old  age,  he  beholds  the  same  — 
still,  still  the  same. 

—  Robert  Burton 


'■--i. 


\ 


Contents 

PART  I   THE  MAKING  OF  A  NATURALIST 

1.  Confessions  of  a  Naturalist  3 

2.  The  Family  6 

3.  The  Mind's  Eye  13 

4.  "For  Richer  for  Poorer"  22 

5.  Wallace  and  the  Dutch  East  41 

6.  Flying  Fish  and  Turtles  58 

7.  The  Sea  and  the  Cave  6$ 

8.  Cuba  87 

9.  The  Bahamas,  Old  and  New  103 

10.  Reptiles  in  the  West  Indies  1 19 

PART  II   THE  SEDENTARY  NATURALIST 

11.  Naturalists  in  Dispute  135 

12.  Three  Friends  140 

13.  Mr.  Justice  Holmes  150 

14.  Lifework  157 

15.  The  Glory  Hole  168 

16.  Those  Who  Help  181 

17.  Panama  193 

18.  Scientists  and  Philosophers  208 

j-7^6  3 


X  .  Contents 

PART  III   THE  LEISURELY  NATURALIST 

19.  Florida  and  Some  Snakes  221 

20.  The  Tests  of  Evolution  2  37 

21.  Whales  245 
2  2 .    Latin  America  250 

23.  Africa  2^4 

24.  In  Retrospect  279 

APPENDICES 

I  For  Zoographers  Only  299 

II  Render  unto  Caesar  3  ^  ^ 


Illustrations 


The  author  and  J.  C.  Greenway,  Jr.,  with  a  Bahama 
Barn  Owl,  at  the  mouth  of  a  cave  near  Landrail 
Point,  Crooked  Island,  Bahamas  Frontispiece 

Sarah  Elizabeth  Barbour,  about  1890  14 

Rosamond  and  Thomas  Barbour,  by  John  Singer  Sar- 
gent, 19 19  22 

The  big  cobra  killed  near  Lucknow  on  the  fifteenth 
of  November,  1906  32 

The  women's  canoe  with  no  outrigger,  only  used  on 
short  journeys;  The  men's  canoe,  used  for  trips  to 
sea.  Humboldt  Bay,  1907  42 

The  Great  Karriwarri  at  Tubadi  Village,  Humboldt 
Bay,  New  Guinea  46 

Two  Karriwarris  at  the  village  of  Tubadi  in  Hum- 
boldt Bay;  Communal  long  houses  over  the  water 
at  Ansus,  Japen  Island,  in  Geelvink  Bay,  Dutch 
New  Guinea  48 

R.  P.  B.  at  Monokwari;  Natives  of  Humboldt  Bay         54 

Utowana  in  Port  Castries  Harbor,  St.  Lucia;  Three 
deep-sea  fish  drawn  by  Alexander  Agassiz  58 

Dancing  Girl  Orchids  recall  the  market  at  San  Sal- 
vador 68 

The  tropical  forest  primeval  along  the  upper  Jesusito 
River,  eastern  Panama  76 


xii  Illustrations 

The  Harvard  Garden,  Soledad,  near  Cienfuegos,  Cuba      88 

The  author  and  "Lizzie"  at  Soledad,  1941;  On  the 
steps  at  the  Aula  Magna,  University  of  Havana, 
March  1930  100 

David  Fairchild  and  William  Morton  Wheeler  at 
Barro  Colorado  Island,  1924;  Henry  B.  Bigelow 
aboard  the  Grampus,  191 3;  John  C.  Phillips,  1934     144 

Three  of  George  Nelson's  finest  fossil  reptiles:  A  sail- 
back  lizard,  Edaphosaurus;  Unique  mount  of  Ophi- 
acodon;  Unique  type  of  Dynodontosaurus  oliveroi 
Romer  from  southern  Brazil  166 

The  Hunter  home  from  the  kill.  Churima  rests  after 
bringing  in  a  peccary  to  camp;  The  author  and 
Juicio,  the  chief  of  all  the  Chokoi  Indians  with 
whom  we  came  in  contact  182 

The  author  with  three  Indians  near  Garachine,  west- 
earn  Panama,  1922;  The  Laboratory  at  Barro  Colo- 
rado Island  194 

One  of  the  giant  Bombacopsis  on  Barro  Colorado 
Island;  Shore-line  vegetation  at  Barro  Colorado 
Island  196 

Our  tent  by  an  almost  dry  stream  in  eastern  Panama; 
Churima's  house,  where  we  hung  our  mosquito  bars 
on  various  occasions  200 

Alexander  Agassiz  and  the  Sultan  of  the  Maldive 
Islands  aboard  the  Amra,  1901  214 

A  yearling  Greater  Kudu  in  the  Kruger  Park  266 

Bird  Island,  forty  miles  off  southeast  Africa  274 

T.  B.'s  office  in  the  Agassiz  Museum  290 


PART  I 

THE   MAKING  OF  A  NATURALIST 


CHAPTER  I 

Confessions  of  a  Naturalist 

JLO  USE  a  witty  simile  of  William  Morton  Wheeler's 
in  a  sense  in  which  he  did  not  use  it,  I  may  say  that  in  the 
home  I  am  a  poor  Peruna-soaked  Methodist,  but  in  the 
Museum  I  am  a  High  Church  port-wine-drinking  Epis- 
copalian. I  came  to  Boston  a  little  too  late  in  life  really  to 
enjoy  the  iteration  and  reiteration  of  Back  Bay  society  gos- 
sip. I  am  inclined  to  creep  off  by  myself  when  Vincent 
Club  politics  hold  the  floor.  To  be  sure,  I  supply  a  presi- 
dent and  vice-president  to  the  Club.  These  are  daughters 
whom  I  see  occasionally  at  eventide.  I  am  old-fashioned  and 
eat  my  breakfast  early;  also,  I  have  insomnia  and  go  to  bed 
early.  My  more  socially-minded  housemates  arise  for  a  cup 
of  black  coffee  and  a  cigarette,  timed  so  as  not  to  spoil  the 
appetite  for  luncheon.  (I'll  confess  this  was  written  before 
the  war  changed  many  habits.) 

I  recall  once  taking  a  distinguished  Southern  Bishop  of 
my  Church  to  a  meeting  of  the  Saturday  Club.  As  we 
walked  away,  he  said,  "The  talk  at  that  table  has  canceled 
out  an  awful  lot  of  banality."  I  have  also  enjoyed  the 
Wednesday  Evening  Club  and  the  Wintersnight.  Being 
the  only  male  in  a  household  composed  of  singularly  mas- 
terful women,  I  have,  for  the  sake  of  peace,  apologized 
and  confessed  to  about  everything  from  mayhem  to  men- 
dacity—perhaps most  often  to  intemperance.  My  trans- 
gressions along  the  latter  line,  however,  have  been  pitifully 


4  Naturalist  at  Large 

moderate  and  puny  compared  to  what  I  often  observe  and 
hear  about  in  others. 

Now  in  the  Museum  all  is  different.  My  staff  does  not 
laugh  at  my  jack-of -all-trades  inclinations.  They  might, 
for  I  have  collected  and  described  mammals,  birds,  rep- 
tiles, amphibians,  fishes,  and  have  collected  countless  in- 
sects and  marine  invertebrates  which  others  have  described. 
I  have  been  by  inclination  an  old-fashioned  naturalist,  many 
tell  me  perhaps  the  last  of  the  breed.  My  colleagues  prefer 
to  know  more  and  more  about  less  and  less  and  so  are  in- 
finitely more  erudite  than  I. 

No  man  has  ever  had  more  fun  with  his  chosen  tasks. 
When  I  am  taxed  with,  "You  never  do  anything  that  you 
don't  want  to  do,"  my  answer  is,  "Not  if  I  can  help  it." 
Father,  bless  him,  left  me  well  endowed  with  this  world's 
goods  and  with  a  nervous,  high-strung  desire  to  hurry 
about  whatever  I  am  attempting  to  do.  This  has  been  my 
chief  source  of  strength  —  and  perhaps  of  weakness,  too. 
I  have  loved  the  three  Museums  in  Boston,  Cambridge,  and 
Salem,  which,  from  time  to  time,  I  have  been  permitted  to 
correct  as  if  they  were  human  friends. 

I  do  not  think  I  am  guilty  of  conceit,  as  was  Rafinesque. 
He  wrote  at  the  close  of  his  autobiography:  — 

Versatility  of  talents  and  of  professions,  is  not  un- 
common in  America;  but  those  which  I  have  exhibited 
in  these  few  pages,  may  appear  to  exceed  belief:  and 
yet  it  is  a  positive  fact  that  in  knowledge  I  have  been  a 
Botanist,  Naturalist,  Geologist,  Geographer,  Histo- 
rian, Poet,  Philosopher,  Philologist,  Economist,  Phi- 
lanthropist. ...   By    profession    a   Traveller,    Mer- 


Confessions  of  a  Naturalist  5 

chant,  Manufacturer,  Collector,  Improver,  Professor, 
Teacher,  Surveyor,  Draftsman,  Architect,  Engineer, 
Pulmist,  Author,  Editor,  Bookseller,  Librarian,  Sec- 
retary .  .  .  and  I  hardly  know  myself  vv^hat  I  may 
not  become  as  yet:  since  whenever  I  apply  myself  to 
anything,  ivhich  I  like,  I  never  fail  to  succeed  if  de- 
pending on  me  alone,  unless  impeded  and  prevented 
by  lack  of  means,  or  the  hostility  of  the  foes  of  man- 
kind. 

God  gave  one  ever-useful  attribute  —  realistic  apprecia- 
tion of  my  own  limitations.  This  has  saved  me  from  taking 
positions  which  I  knew  I  could  not  fill  acceptably  and 
generally  from  biting  off  more  than  I  could  chew. 


CHAPTER  II 

The  Family 


A 


STRONG  family  likeness  runs  through  our  family. 
My  brother  Robert  looks  extraordinarily  like  our  Great- 
Uncle  Robert,  for  whom  he  was  named.  I  went  into  the 
State  House  in  Richmond  one  day  with  my  friend,  Cotes- 
worth  Pinckney,  to  see  whether  there  might  not  be  por- 
traits of  James  Barbour  and  Phillip  Pendleton  Barbour 
there,  since  both  had  been  Governors  of  Virginia  long  ago. 
We  had  barely  entered  the  room  when  Cotesworth  said, 
"Well,  there's  one  of  them  all  right,"  and  pointed  to  a 
picture  which  turned  out  to  be  labeled  '']2Lmts  Barbour." 
And  yet  these  were  distant  kin. 

My  three  brothers  and  I  present  four  types.  My  brother 
Robert,  who  is  two  years  younger  than  I  am,  is  the  mathe- 
matician of  the  family.  His  facility  with  figures  is  amaz- 
ing to  me,  for  I  am  hopelessly  incompetent  in  this  respect. 
He  also  has  marked  mechanical  ability,  coupled  with 
manual  dexterity,  and  even  before  he  went  to  the  School 
of  Mines  at  Columbia  he  had  a  workshop  on  top  of  Father's 
New  York  house  — now  the  Museum  of  Modern  Art, 
II  West  53rd  Street.  This  workshop  was  fitted  up  with 
lathes  and  all  sorts  of  mechanical  tools.  There  with  David 
Dows  he  built  an  automobile,  one  of  the  first  in  the  city, 
which  actually  ran  when  it  was  lowered  into  the  street. 
One  of  the  more  amusing  aspects  of  that  feat  was  the  con- 
fidence David  showed  in  their  combined  abihty.  He  bought 


The  Family  1 

the  horn  before  they  began  work  on  their  contraption. 
Robert  has  now  retired  to  well-earned  leisure,  after  a  use- 
ful career  in  charge  of  the  manufacturing  department  of 
the  Linen  Thread  Company. 

My  brother  Warren,  four  years  younger  than  I  am, 
started  out  as  a  chubby,  rolypoly  little  boy.  Just  as  he  was 
about  to  enter  Princeton,  the  death  of  one  of  my  father's 
business  associates  made  an  opening  which  Father  thought 
was  too  good  to  pass  up,  so  Warren  went  into  the  office. 
Early  in  life  he  developed  tuberculosis  and  spent  some  time 
in  the  Adirondacks  where  Father  had  a  big  hunting  pre- 
serve, in  the  care  of  Grandmother's  friend.  Dr.  Edward 
Trudeau.  He  was  entirely  cured,  went  to  Bermuda,  and  in 
less  than  no  time  became  well  known  as  an  amateur  boxer. 
He  became  amateur  champion  heavyweight  of  the  United 
States  in  19 lo  and  could  at  this  time  probably  have  out- 
boxed  anyone  in  the  country;  but  Mother  did  not  take 
kindly  to  the  idea  of  his  fighting  and  naturally  he  gave  it 
up.  He  is  now  United  States  Senator  from  New  Jersey, 
having  piled  up  a  greater  number  of  votes  than  any  other 
RepubHcan  candidate  in  the  last  election,  which  means 
something  in  New  Jersey,  where  election  practices  are  still 
what  they  were  in  other  parts  of  the  country  fifty  years 
ago. 

My  brother  Frederick,  born  in  1894,  has  now  inherited 
the  presidency  of  the  Linen  Thread  Company,  but,  to  my 
mind,  shows  great  good  sense  in  taking  time  off  for  the 
field  sports  which  he  loves.  This  has  given  me  an  oppor- 
tunity of  late  years  to  see  rather  more  of  him  than  of  my 
other  brothers,  since  we  both  love  to  hunt  and  to  fish. 
Frederick  is  the  finest  hand  with  a  wet  fly  for  salmon  that 


8  Naturalist  at  Large 

I  have  ever  seen.  He  can  tlirow  a  fly  a  prodigious  distance 
with  absolute  accuracy  and  then  at  the  end  of  the  cast  have 
the  fly  just  touch  the  water  as  if  it  were  a  bit  of  falling 
thistledown. 

My  brothers  and  I  owe  Father  several  different  debts  of 
gratitude.  He  left  us  not  only  with  the  means  but  also  the 
opportunity  to  take  up  our  several  totally  different  ways  of 
living.  I  was  enabled  to  build  up  a  fine  Hbrary  and  to  spend 
my  life  as  a  volunteer  servant  of  Harvard  College.  Father 
loved  the  out-of-doors  and  was  a  good  observer  himself 
in  the  field,  but  I  do  not  think  he  was  particularly  pleased 
that  I  became  a  naturalist.  He  hoped  that  I  would  follow 
him  in  his  business. 

He  delighted,  however,  in  the  fact  that  for  many  years 
he  had  my  other  brothers  in  association  with  him  in  either 
the  executive,  the  seUing,  or  the  manufacturing  ends  of 
the  Linen  Thread  Company  and  the  American  Net  & 
Twine  Company.  During  the  last  years  of  his  fife  he  ex- 
tended himself  dangerously,  acquiring  a  locomotive  works 
in  Chicago  and  other  scattered  interests  which  were  diffi- 
cult to  supervise  adequately.  I  owe  a  deep  debt  of  grati- 
tude to  my  brothers  who  at  his  death  unwound  the  tan- 
gled skein  of  his  affairs,  something  at  which  I  was  incap- 
able of  giving  more  than  a  small  share  of  assistance.  By 
injudicious  handhng  of  his  enormous  outstanding  loans 
they  might  easily  have  landed  me  in  the  poorhouse, 
but  they  were  well  equipped  to  make  their  way  in  the 
world. 

No  two  persons  were  ever  more  completely  unlike  than 
my  mother  and  father.  My  mother  loved  New  York,  and 
by  this  I  mean  the  city  itself.  None  of  her  younger  days 


The  Family  9 

had  been  spent  in  the  country,  for  her  father  —  my  grand- 
father —  had  moved  up  from  Charleston,  South  Carohna, 
to  New  York  a  short  time  before  the  Civil  War,  taking 
with  him  his  slaves.  He  was  left  impoverished  and  died 
shortly  after  the  war  was  over.  He  was  a  Southern  sym- 
pathizer, and  suffered  deeply  as  a  result  of  his  convictions 
during  the  last  few  years  of  his  life  in  New  York.  My 
grandmother  Sprague  moved  with  her  young  brood  to 
Geneva,  Switzerland,  where  one  could  live  at  small  cost. 
After  three  years,  when  the  financial  outlook  was  a  bit 
brighter,  they  sailed  back  to  America  and  entered  New 
York  Harbor  to  see  a  column  of  smoke  rising  from  the 
lower  end  of  Manhattan  Island.  It  was  the  storage  ware- 
house containing  all  their  earthly  belongings  —  everything 
they  owned  was  lost. 

Mother  was  a  tall  and  stately  person  to  the  very  end  of 
her  life.  She  was  tall  for  a  woman,  for  she  was  slightly 
over  six  feet.  I  have  no  doubt  that  in  her  youth  she  was 
very  handsome. 

Mother  had  a  deeply  religious  character,  Calvinistic  and 
fundamentaHst,  but  utterly  sincere  in  her  belief.  I  never 
knew  a  person  who  tried  harder  to  be  just  and  fair.  She 
leaned  over  backward  in  this  respect.  Brought  up  as  she 
was,  it  was  a  little  difficult  to  convince  her  that  there  was 
no  essential  difficulty  in  accepting  such  modern  scientific 
behefs  as  the  theory  of  evolution  without  jeopardy  to  the 
faith  which  she  treasured  so  sincerely. 

She  and  my  father's  mother  did  not  particularly  care  for 
each  other  and  I  think  the  reason  really  was  that  the  male 
members  of  Grandmother's  family  on  both  sides,  the  War- 
rens and  the  Sayreses,  were  officers  in  the  Union  Army, 


10  Naturalist  at  Large 

whereas  Mother's  family  were  not  at  all  convinced  of  the 
righteousness  of  the  Northern  cause.  They  were  in  fact 
Copperheads. 

While  Mother  did  not  play  any  musical  instrument,  she 
had  a  lovely  soprano  voice  and  took  music  lessons  to  well 
within  the  years  of  my  memory.  She  and  Father  had  the 
same  seats  at  the  Opera  for  many  years  and  I  remember 
particularly  the  pleasure  she  derived  during  the  last  years 
of  her  life  from  the  Bagby  Concerts  which  she  attended 
very  regularly. 

Mother  was  just,  as  I  have  said,  but  she  had  a  sharp  and 
flaring  temper  and  she  thrashed  us  youngsters  on  number- 
less occasions.  I  remember  that  she  had  a  giant  hairbrush 
which  had  belonged  to  Grandfather  Barbour  which  was 
specially  reserved  for  spanking.  Warren  terminated  its  use- 
fulness permanently  when  he  surreptitiously  slipped  a  flat 
stone  inside  the  seat  of  his  pants  and  the  hairbrush  was 
shattered  once  and  for  all,  to  our  great  joy. 

She  went  to  the  Adirondacks  with  Father  from  a  sense 
of  duty  and  while  she  liked  to  row  a  boat  about  the  lake 
herself  for  exercise  she  never  fished  or  hunted,  nor  do  I 
believe  that  she  could  have  told  a  beet  from  a  carrot  when 
they  were  growing  in  the  garden.  She  had  no  knowledge 
of  or  interest  in  the  country  — no  interest  in  nature,  in 
birds  or  flowers,  nor  in  woods  or  fields. 

Father  on  the  other  hand  inherited  his  mother's  love  of 
outdoor  life,  her  love  of  shooting  and  fishing,  and  a  very 
considerable  knowledge  concerning  the  birds  and  animals 
which  he,  came  across  from  time  to  time.  He  passed  this 
enjoyment  of  shooting  on  to  his  sons.  His  father  acquired 


The  Family  11 

a  share  In  what  was  called  the  Tupper  Lake  Club  in  north- 
ern New  York,  and  went  there  to  shoot  and  fish  with 
Grandmother  when  Father  was  a  little  boy.  Gradually  the 
members  died  off  and  Father  acquired  the  property.  This 
consisted  of  about  145  acres  on  the  southeasterly  shore  of 
Big  Tupper  Lake.  And  Paradise  Point,  on  which  the  famous 
Coleman's  Spring  was  the  outstanding  feature  of  the  prop- 
erty. Here  Father  built  a  camp  where  for  years  he  came 
for  relaxation  and  enjoyment  after  the  hard  life  so  char- 
acteristic of  the  businessmen  of  his  day,  who  speculated 
daringly  albeit  successfully,  but  certainly  to  the  peril  of 
their  nervous  system.  Father  had  his  father's  passion  for 
acquiring  land.  Grandfather  bought  tracts  of  land  scat- 
tered over  New  Jersey,  usually  because  there  was  a  pretty 
view  over  some  attractive  pond,  whereas  Father  kept  add- 
ing to  his  Adirondack  holdings  until  at  his  death  he  had 
at  least  45,000  acres. 

Father  was  not  skillful  with  his  hands  any  more  than  I 
am,  although  his  handwriting  was  superb.  Nevertheless, 
he  loved  to  watch  work  and  the  work  he  liked  best  was 
the  building  of  stone  walls.  I  often  drove  oxen  hitched  to 
a  stone  boat  and  hauled  rocks  with  him.  My  brother 
Robert,  the  mechanic,  ran  the  big  stone  crusher,  and  every 
year  we  built  roads  and  stone  walls.  When  it  was  time  to 
knock  off  Father  went  for  his  evening  bout  of  fishing 
with  Dan  Hinkson,  who  simply  adored  him.  Father  had  a 
stately  figure,  and  was  possessed  of  great  personal  beauty 
and  dignity.  He  was  six  feet  three  inches  tall  and  often 
said,  "I  and  my  four  boys  are  just  a  half  inch  shy  of  being 
thirty-one  feet  of  Barbour."  Unfortunately  for  me  I  was 
the  tallest  of  the  lot,  and  I  have  suffered  from  colliding 


12  Naturalist  at  Large 

with  chandeliers  and  low  doonvays,  and  from  short  sleep- 
ing-car and  steamer  berths,  all  my  Ufe. 

A  flood  of  pleasant  memories  surround  the  stories  of  our 
life  at  Tupper  Lake.  I  can  close  my  eyes  and  see  the  great 
flock  of  lovely  swan  swimming  past  Warren  Point  just  a 
mile  or  so  north  of  Father's  Paradise  Point  camp,  where 
for  several  summers  I  had  a  lovely  home  of  my  own,  thanks 
to  his  generosity.  He  took  the  greatest  pride  in  his  swan, 
his  peacock,  his  Kerry  cattle,  his  oxen,  and  his  bees,  and 
in  the  ever-changing  beauty  of  the  scene  which  unfolded  as 
summer  changed  to  autumn  in  the  north  woods. 

My  three  brothers  and  I  were  a  fortunate  crew. 

After  Father's  death  it  was  quite  obvious  that  the  reserve 
at  Tupper  Lake  was  more  than  we  four  could  swing. 
Father's  estate,  cut  in  quarters  and  the  death  duties  paid, 
was  of  a  quite  different  order  of  magnitude  from  what 
it  had  been  when  he  was  alive.  Fortunately  the  State  of 
New  York  needed  lands  for  a  forest  reserve  and  to  pro- 
tect watersheds  which,  in  the  future,  may  have  to  be  drawn 
upon  for  the  use  of  the  City  of  New  York.  They  bought 
all  of  the  unimproved  acreage.  The  farm  and  its  various 
buildings,  Father's  camp  and  my  camp,  were  purchased 
by  the  American  Legion  as  a  tuberculosis  sanatorium.  I 
have  often  wondered  whether  the  convalescent  Legion- 
naires have  appreciated  the  beauty  spread  before  their  eyes. 
Mount  Morris,  one  of  the  handsomest  domes  in  the  whole 
Adirondacks  area,  lies  right  directly  across  the  lake  from 
these  camps,  and  when  the  autumn  foliage  is  richest  the 
reflection  in  the  lake  is  frequently  one  of  breath-taking 
beauty. 


CHAPTER  III 

The  Mind's  Eye 


I 


WAS  born  August  19,  1884,  on  the  island  of  Martha's 
Vineyard.  My  mother  went  there  to  visit  her  mother,  and 
I  arrived  unexpectedly.  When  I  was  six  weeks  old  my 
father  and  mother  went  to  Ireland  on  business,  and  I  went 
along  in  a  bureau  drawer  of  the  old  Cunard  liner  U?nbria  — 
my  peregrinations  began  early.  Father  went  back  and 
forth  to  Europe  several  times  a  year.  He  had  succeeded 
his  father  as  a  director  of  William  Barbour  and  Son, 
the  firm  founded  by  his  great-grandfather,  which  had  linen 
mills  near  Lisburn  in  Ireland. 

When  I  was  eight  years  old  we  made  a  long  tour  through 
Europe.  I  remember  vividly  the  terror  caused  by  the  chol- 
era outbreak  in  Hamburg  that  year.  We  were  visiting  at 
Mr.  Fritz  Krupp's  house  at  Essen,  an  extraordinary  estab- 
lishment. The  house  was  a  palace,  the  gardens  enormous. 
The  place  was  entirely  self-contained,  Mr.  Krupp  even 
having  his  own  fire  department.  I  think  his  Arab  horses 
impressed  me  more  than  anything  else,  although  I  remem- 
ber staring  with  wonderment  at  a  room  stacked  high  with 
Oriental  rugs.  Mr.  Krupp,  who  had  been  an  old  friend  and 
schoolmate  of  my  father  in  Germany,  explained  that  the 
Sultan  of  Turkey  was  often  short  of  cash  and  occasionally 
paid  for  his  munitions  in  commodities.  We  had  a  wonder- 
ful time  pestering  our  governess  by  doing  everything  mis- 
chievous we  could  think  of;  my  brother  Rob  and  I  tipped 


14  Naturalist  at  Large 

the  young  Crown  Prince  of  Bavaria  into  a  rather  deep 
fountain,  and  for  this,  naturally,  we  got  the  devil. 

I  recall  that  when  we  visited  the  Zoo  at  Frankfurt  am 
Main,  the  keeper  reached  into  a  cage,  opened  a  tiny  box, 
parted  the  cotton  wool  — and  there,  curled  up,  was  a 
pigmy  lemur.  He  said  it  was  the  smallest  of  all  the  mon- 
key family.  I  can  see  the  little  beast  now  in  my  mind's 
eye  — a  tiny,  gray,  fuzzy  ball  scarcely  larger  than  a 
mouse.  The  event  came  back  to  my  mind  the  other  day 
when  I  put  a  lovely  little  mounted  specimen  of  Microcebus 
on  exhibition. 

The  cholera  got  so  bad  that  we  hurried  back  to  America, 
and  I  cannot  think  of  any  events  that  played  much  part  in 
my  wishing  to  become  a  naturalist  by  profession  until 
1898,  when  I  had  typhoid  fever.  My  brother  Rob  and  I 
both  had  typhoid  fever  twice.  In  those  days,  no  one  knew 
the  difference  between  typhoid  and  paratyphoid  —  which, 
I  suspect,  accounts  for  our  unusual  misfortune. 

After  the  first  of  these  illnesses  I  was  shipped  to  Eau 
Gallie,  Florida,  where  my  grandmother  had  a  winter  home. 
Grandmother,  born  Sarah  Elizabeth  Warren,  was  an  ex- 
traordinary character.  She  was  the  best  shot  with  rifle  or 
shotgun  I  ever  knew,  and  she  threw  as  pretty  a  salmon  or 
trout  fly  as  my  brother  Frederick.  She  was  devoted  to 
Thoreau,  and  went  to  Keene  Valley  to  hear  Dr.  Thomas 
Davidson  lecture  on  philosophy.  I  once  met  him  at  her 
house  in  Paterson,  New  Jersey.  He  said,  "Where  there  are 
two  Toms  together,  the  older  is  a  fool."  I  felt  sheepish  but, 
curiously  enough,  remembered  the  remark. 

Grandmother  was  a  born  naturalist.  She  loved  the  out- 
of-doors,  and  with  her  I  made  my  first  memorable  excur- 


Photo  by  Pack  Bros. 


Sarah  Elizabeth  Barbour 
About  1 8 go 


The  Mind's  Eye  15 

sions.  We  went  to  Lake  Washington,  at  the  head  of  the 
Saint  Johns  River  in  Florida.  We  put  a  boat  on  a  wagon, 
Gene  Kinniard  drove  the  team,  and  I  rode  a  marsh  tacky 
alongside.  We  used  to  leave  the  house  at  two  o'clock  in 
the  morning  and  get  to  the  lake  about  daylight.  We  built 
fires  and  cooked  our  meals  at  the  Cabbage  Mound,  a  tall 
grove  of  cabbage  palm  trees,  high  and  dry  in  the  midst  of 
a  quaking  bog,  which  extended  for  miles  after  a  heavy  rain. 
TTie  fishing  was  good,  and  the  birds  were  a  sight  to  behold. 
I  never  go  near  this  part  of  the  world  now  without  driv- 
ing from  Eau  Gallie  out  to  the  Mound,  a  drive  of  about 
half  an  hour  by  motor;  but  every  inch  of  the  road,  indeed 
of  that  whole  country,  is  loaded  with  golden  memories. 

My  grandmother  was  not  particularly  tall  but  she  was 
strikingly  beautiful,  even  in  her  old  age,  and  entirely  aware 
of  the  fact.  She  was  inordinately  proud  of  her  hair,  which 
reached  almost  to  her  heels  when  she  let  it  down.  She  was 
usually  as  brown  as  a  gypsy  and  was  as  restless  as  I  am. 
It  was  nothing  for  her  to  slip  quietly  away  and  then  send 
us  a  letter  from  Stavanger  in  Norway,  where  she  had  gone 
salmon  fishing,  or  from  Cuba,  or  from  Gaspe. 

Her  father  was  a  clergyman,  the  Reverend  Dr.  David 
Allen  Warren,  who  started  as  a  Presbyterian  but  got  into 
a  row  with  the  Synod  because  he  declared  that  the  Lord's 
Prayer  was  incorrectly  translated  —  it  was  insulting  to  ask 
the  Lord  not  to  lead  us  into  temptation  because,  naturally, 
He  would  not  be  so  unkind  as  to  do  any  such  thing.  The 
congregation,  being  very  fond  of  him,  slid  with  him  over 
into  the  Congregational  fold  with  its  complete  autonomy, 
and  he  continued  to  preach  in  Verona,  New  York,  until 
his  death. 

Verona  was  near  an  Indian  reservation,  and  Grand- 


16  Naturalist  at  Large 

mother  thrilled  me  with  tales  of  how,  as  a  little  girl,  she 
would  come  down  early  in  the  morning  to  dig  out  the  pine 
knot  which  was  buried  in  the  embers  each  evening  so  that 
the  fire  could  be  easily  kindled  the  next  day.  She  would 
sometimes  find  three  or  four  Indians  sleeping  on  the  floor 
in  front  of  the  hearth.  They  would  leave  a  haunch  of  veni- 
son, or  fish  from  Oneida  Lake,  or  berries,  out  of  gratitude 
for  the  hospitality.  The  time,  of  course,  was  well  over  a 
hundred  years  ago. 

Grandmother  and  I  went  down  to  Miami  from  Eau 
GaUie.  The  railroad  had  only  been  built  a  short  time 
before,  and  we  stayed  at  the  Royal  Palm  Hotel,  which  was 
then  only  partly  built.  A  day  or  two  after  we  arrived,  a 
gray-haired  gentleman  in  the  dining  room  came  over  and 
spoke  to  Grandmother.  He  was  Henry  M.  Flagler,  who  had 
been  an  usher  at  her  wedding.  He  suggested  that  we  go 
with  him  to  Nassau,  where  he  was  to  buy  some  property. 

So  it  happened  that  I  got  in  Nassau  my  first  glimpse  of 
the  tropics  —  an  iron  which  entered  so  deeply  into  my 
soul  that  it  is  still  completely  embedded.  The  specimens  of 
snakes  and  lizards  which  I  secured  at  that  time  became  the 
nucleus  of  my  own  collection  and  are  now  part  of  the 
collections  of  the  Museum  of  Comparative  Zoology  at 
Harvard.  Imagine  a  timid,  introspective  youngster  thrown, 
at  the  most  impressionable  moment  of  his  life,  into  the  one 
spot  most  ideally  framed  to  arouse  imagination  to  the 
fullest.  Grandmother  was  as  keen  as  I  to  sail  over  the  Sea 
Gardens  and  peer  at  their  wonders  through  a  water  glass. 
I  don't  remember  glass-bottomed  boats  in  Nassau  at  this 
early  date.  We  sailed  among  the  little  cays  which  surround 
New  Providence  Island,  picnicked,  and  collected  shells. 


The  Mind's  Eye  17 

Grandmother  made  herself  extremely  unpopular  by  col- 
lecting and  taking  back  with  her  to  Eau  GaUie  one  John 
Sumpter,  who  had  been  Lady  Blake's  gardener  —  and  Sir 
Henry  Blake  was  Governor  of  the  Bahamas.  He  took  care 
of  her  garden  till  he  died. 

I  can  thank  Grandmother  for  starting  me  on  the  road 
to  being  a  naturalist  —  she  was  the  only  member  of  the 
family  who  thoroughly  encouraged  me  all  the  time.  Father 
and  Mother  were  perfectly  fair  and  believed  that  I  had 
the  right  to  decide  about  my  own  career,  but  they  were 
utterly  unenthusiastic.  I  think  the  only  time  Father  ever 
came  to  the  University  Museum  —  it  must  have  been  early 
in  my  freshman  year  —  he  walked  up  to  Alexander  Agas- 
siz  and  asked  if  he  knew  where  I  could  be  found.  At  this 
time,  of  course,  Mr.  Agassiz  didn't  know  me  from  Adam. 
But  he  asked  Father,  "What  is  your  son  interested  in?" 
and  Father  answered,  "Pickling  toads."  So  Mr.  Agassiz 
steered  him  down  to  Samuel  Garman's  quarters  where  he 
found  me. 

I  was  no  stranger  to  the  Museum,  for  the  reason  that  I 
had  been  previously  under  the  spell  of  an  ardent  lover  of 
Harvard,  Theodore  W.  Moses  of  Exeter.  Dr.  Moses,  a 
friend  of  my  father,  tutored  me  when  I  had  trouble  at 
school  because  of  an  attack  of  typhoid  fever  which  knocked 
me  flat  in  the  middle  of  the  school  year.  He  asked  Father 
to  allow  him  to  take  me  to  Cambridge  when  he  went  up 
for  his  twenty-fifth  reunion  in  June  1 899.  I  had  been  des- 
tined for  Princeton,  but  this  visit  to  Cambridge  changed 
the  course  of  my  life.  I  did  not  want  to  hsten  to  the  tire- 
some speeches  on  the  afternoon  of  Commencement  Day,  so 
I  sneaked  off  and  visited  the  Museum.  Here  I  wandered 


18  Naturalist  at  Large 

alone  for  hours,  completely  entranced.  I  had  been  often  to 
the  natural  history  museums  in  New  York  and  Washing- 
ton, but  here  was  something  entirely  different,  and  I  soon 
discovered  that  this  was  essentially  a  museum  for  the  edi- 
fication of  naturalists  rather  than  for  the  great  urban  public 
which  the  museum  in  New  York  had  to  cater  to. 

I  spotted  some  specimens  which  I  thought  were  wrongly 
labeled  —  and  as  a  matter  of  fact  they  were.  I  wrote  with 
all  the  dignity  of  my  thirteen  years  to  Dr.  Woodworth, 
then  Acting  Custodian  of  the  Museum,  who  was  rather  in- 
furiated by  my  temerity.  As  I  look  back  on  it,  I  don't 
blame  him.  I  suspect  that  my  letter  was  as  fresh  as  green 
paint.  I  made  up  my  mind  that  very  day  that  if  I  lived  I 
would  be  Director  of  the  Museum.  I  had  to  wait  until  1927. 
Mr.  Lowell  wanted  me  to  take  office  earlier,  but  I  begged 
him  not  to  push  matters.  I  was  perfectly  willing  to  wait 
out  of  consideration  for  my  predecessor.  No  consideration 
was  ever  more  completely  wasted,  or  more  ill-conceived, 
for  my  predecessor  left  the  Museum  in  a  huff  and  never 
entered  it  again  or  spoke  to  me  as  long  as  he  lived  —  and 
he  lived  to  the  ripe  old  age  of  ninety-one. 

I  came  to  college  as  complete  a  social  misfit  as  ever 
breathed.  I  was  abnormally  shy,  suffered  from  a  bad  in- 
feriority complex,  was  tall  and  gangling.  But  fortune  fa- 
vored me.  I  had  spent  the  summer  of  1 90 1  at  a  boys'  camp 
near  Bridgewater,  New  Hampshire.  There  I  had  a  won- 
derful time  puttering  with  a  tiny  museum  of  natural  history 
and  writing  a  list  of  the  reptiles  of  New  Hampshire  and 
something  of  their  habits.  Dr.  Glover  M.  Allen  had  been  a 
counselor  in  this  camp  the  year  before,  and  in  some  way  I 


The  Mind's  Eye  19 

learned  that  he  was  a  kind  and  friendly  person.  So  he 
proved  to  be. 

When  I  came  to  college  I  chose  a  room  in  the  corner  of 
Conant  Hall,  because  there  was  no  place  where  I  could  be 
nearer  the  Museum.  I  chose  Professor  Robert  T.  Jackson 
as  my  Freshman  Adviser,  to  my  great  good  fortune,  for 
he  and  I  have  been  good  friends  from  that  day  to  this. 
I  soon  found  that  Allen  roomed  in  Perkins  Hall,  directly 
across  Oxford  Street  from  my  lodgings,  and  as  soon  as  I 
was  settled  and  had  an  evening  clear,  I  went  over  and 
knocked  at  the  door  of  28  Perkins  Hall.  I  found  him  and 
his  roommate,  Austin  H.  Clark,  both  at  home  and  intro- 
duced myself.  One  thing  led  to  another.  Austin  Clark  in- 
troduced me  to  Garman  in  the  Museum.  Allen  introduced 
me  to  Henry  B.  Bigelow,  who  was  preparing  to  take  his 
doctor's  degree,  as  was  Glover.  Gradually  I  found  myself 
at  least  a  tolerated  member  of  a  small  congenial  group  of 
men  of  the  highest  intellectual  quality,  whose  conversa- 
tion was  infinitely  more  enlightening  and  educational  than 
most  of  the  courses  which  I  took  during  my  not  particu- 
larly distinguished  undergraduate  career. 

It  was  while  I  was  in  college  that  my  brother  Warren 
contracted  tuberculosis  and  Dr.  Trudeau  cured  him  at 
Saranac.  Then  he  advised  Warren  to  go  to  Bermuda  for 
the  winter.  I  joined  him  for  the  Christmas  holidays.  As 
usual,  I  was  infatuated  with  the  chance  to  collect.  The 
coral  reefs  at  Hungry  Bay  were  easily  reached  at  low  tide, 
and  everything  was  new  and  enchanting. 

I  stayed  in  Bermuda  long  after  I  should  have  been  back 
in  Cambridge.  On  my  return  I  got  more  or  less  caught  up, 
but  my  marks  were  not  very  good.  The  next  spring  Dr. 


20  Naturalist  at  Large 

Bigelow  and  I  went  to  Bermuda  with  Professor  Mark  to 
open  the  Bermuda  Biological  Station  for  Research,  an 
organization  which  still  exists.  While  in  Bermuda  on  this 
second  trip  I  got  word  that  Professor  Shaler  had  done  the 
unprecedented  and  had  given  me  a  D  in  Geology  4.  This 
made  me  a  dropped  freshman  when  I  returned  to  college, 
and  I  had  to  report  like  a  convict  on  parole  to  Dean  George 
H.  Chase.  Then  I  began  to  work  at  my  studies.  Next  term 
I  was  again  in  good  standing  and  got  good  marks  for  the 
rest  of  my  undergraduate  years.  But  when  the  time  came 
to  take  my  A.B.  degree  I  asked  the  registrar,  Mr.  George 
Washington  Cram,  whether  it  could  not  be  granted  cum 
laude  as  I  had  the  requisite  number  of  A's  and  B's.  I  found, 
however,  that  my  sins  were  not  to  be  forgiven  me,  and  I 
got  no  such  thing. 

I  did  not  take  my  A.M.  until  after  I  had  come  back  from 
the  East  Indies,  nor  my  Ph.D.  until  after  I  had  been  to 
South  America  as  a  member  of  the  North  American  dele- 
gation to  the  First  Pan-American  Scientific  Congress,  held 
at  Santiago,  Chile,  in  1908.  Professor  Archibald  Cary 
Coolidge  was  a  member  of  our  delegation.  Probably  I 
should  never  have  met  him  if  we  had  not  been  thrown 
together  in  this  way,  for  I  took  no  history  or  economics, 
or  indeed  anything,  during  those  days  of  free  electives, 
except  zoology,  botany,  and  languages.  Archie  and  his  sec- 
retary, Clarence  Hay,  became  dear  and  valued  friends. 

On  the  Santiago  trip,  Archie  would  come  up  to  me  at 
sea  with  two  pads  and  pencils  and  we  would  see  how 
quickly  we  could  write  down  the  names  of  the  nineteen 
provinces  of  China  or  the  twenty-three  states  of  Mexico, 
or  bound  the  province  of  Uganda  or  Togoland,  or  name 


The  Mind's  Eye  21 

the  Grenadine  Islands.  It  was  good  practice  in  learning 
geography,  and  a  knowledge  of  geography  is  infinitely  use- 
ful to  a  museologist.  I  don't  say  that  I  always  won  at  these 
games,  but  I  held  my  own  pretty  well,  and  Archie  made  me 
feel  proud  by  saying  that  he  had  never  known  any  other 
person  who  knew  so  many  place  names  and  their  loca- 
tion. It  was  simply  the  vagary  of  a  peculiar  type  of  mem- 
ory. But  this,  with  an  ability  to  remember  the  names  of 
animals,  thousands  and  thousands  of  them,  has  been  use- 
ful; and  I  have  more  luck  in  holding  onto  the  names  of 
more  different  kinds  of  animals  than  anyone  I  have  ever 
met.  I  feel  perfectly  certain,  however,  that  my  friend  El- 
mer Merrill  can  name  more  plants  at  a  glance  than  I  can 
animals. 

While  I  was  an  undergraduate  I  was  too  shy  to  make 
any  friends  among  my  classmates.  I  came  to  know  some  of 
them  very  well  later  on,  I  am  proud  to  say,  the  most  dis- 
tinguished of  them  being  Herbert  Winlock,  noted  Egyptol- 
ogist and  former  Director  of  the  Metropolitan  Museum  of 
Art  in  New  York.  I  Hterally  did  not  know  that  there  were 
any  such  things  as  clubs  in  Cambridge.  I  had  heard  some 
names,  but  they  meant  nothing  to  me.  I  joined  the  Harvard 
Natural  History  Society  and  attended  its  meetings  quite 
faithfully,  becoming  president  in  my  senior  year.  Many 
years  later  I  was  made  an  Honorary  Member  of  the  Signet 
and  was  much  touched  at  the  compliment,  as  I  was  when 
elected  an  Honorary  Member  of  Phi  Beta  Kappa. 


CHAPTER  IV 

95 


"  For  Richer  for  Poorer 


E 


VEN  before  I  entered  Harvard,  one  of  the  greatest 
stimulants  to  my  career  had  come  to  me  in  the  course  of 
my  schoolboy  visits  to  the  New  York  Zoological  Park, 
where  I  used  to  spend  my  Saturdays.  I  knew  Professor 
Henry  Fairfield  Osborn,  the  President  of  the  Zoological 
Society,  because  one  of  his  sons  was  a  schoolmate  of  mine. 
To  me,  a  shy  fifteen-year-older  in  those  days,  he  seemed 
very  awesome,  but  one  Saturday  afternoon  he  did  some- 
thing which  enriched  my  life  more  than  he  ever  realized. 
On  this  occasion  he  sat  down  beside  me  in  the  train  going 
back  from  the  Bronx  to  Grand  Central  Station.  He  asked 
me  what  I  had  been  reading  and  then  said,  "There  are  four 
great  books  for  boys  who  like  natural  history."  And  he 
named  them:  Wallace's  Malay  Archipelago,  Belt's  The 
Naturalist  in  Nicaragua,  Bates's  book  on  the  Amazon,  and 
Hudson's  on  the  La  Plata  region.  Well,  I  read  them  in  this 
order.  Wallace's  book,  coming  first,  made  the  greatest  im- 
pression; I  read  it  over  and  over  again  until  I  knew  it  almost 
by  heart.  And  my  desire  to  see  the  Dutch  East  Indies  be- 
came so  all-consuming  that  I  must  have  seemed  a  veritable 
monomaniac  to  my  parents. 

I  was  married  on  the  first  of  October,  1906.  When  I 
had  won  a  yes  from  Rosamond,  in  the  face  of  countless 
competitors,  I  soft-pedaled  the  fact  that  I  planned  to  leave 
for  the  Dutch  East  Indies  as  soon  as  we  were  married.  This 


Rosamond 

and 

Thomas  Barbour 


By  John  Singer  Sargent,  191^ 


'''For  Richer  for  Poorer'  23 

news,  when  It  broke,  caused  a  bit  of  a  surprise.  My  wife 
had  once  been  west  of  the  Adirondacks,  once  south  to  New 
York,  and  once  north  to  North  Haven. 

She  had  lived  in  Brookhne,  surrounded  by  untold  cohorts 
of  Bowditches,  Higginsons,  and  Cabots,  all  kin,  and  many 
of  them  what  in  Charleston  would  be  called  "kissin'  kin." 
I  do  not  have  to  enlarge  upon  the  fact  that  she  is  a  strong- 
minded  and  masterful  person;  if  you  belong  in  these  clans 
you  are  that  automatically.  I  cry  at  funerals  and  at  movies 
and  at  certain  types  of  music,  particularly  "The  Flowers 
of  the  Forest"  on  a  good  pipes  band.  She  always  has  her 
emotions  completely  in  hand.  She  is  as  bold  and  daring, 
especially  in  facing  misfortune,  as  I  am  shrinking  and  cow- 
ardly. 

The  day  after  Rosamond  and  I  were  married  we  sailed 
on  the  Ivernia  for  Queenstown.  My  father's  family  came 
from  Northern  Ireland,  and  in  1906  a  number  of  his  uncles 
were  still  alive  and  were  keen  to  have  a  look  at  my  bride. 
I  cannot  remember  now  which  one  gave  the  party,  but  a 
celebration  was  staged  in  honor  of  our  arrival.  A  big  bar- 
rel of  Jamieson's,  not  too  old,  was  put  out  on  the  lawn 
for  the  benefit  of  all  and  sundry.  The  next  day  I  met  Danny 
Ferris,  one  of  the  gardeners,  and  asked  him  if  he  had  had 
a  good  time.  He  said,  "Oh,  God,  Mr.  Tommy,  I  could 
neither  stand  up,  nor  sit  down,  nor  roll  on  the  ground." 
He  must  have  been  really  tight.  Pat  Dooley  told  me  that 
his  wife  had  bitten  him.  And  he  added,  "I  was  only  bit 
but  twice  in  me  life,  once  by  me  ass  and  once  by  me 
woman.  And  yesterday  I  wished  to  God  the  ass  had  swal- 
lowed me." 

My  Uncle  James's  two  old  gardeners,  bosom  friends, 


24  Naturalist  at  Large 

walked  down  the  road  after  the  party,  one  saying  to  the 
other,  "Don't  say  it,"  and  the  other  muttering,  "I  must! 
I  must!"  This  was  repeated  over  and  over  again  until  one 
blurted  out,  "To  hell  with  King  William."  And  his  col- 
league, who  was  a  Protestant,  promptly  picked  up  a  cob- 
blestone, knocked  him  on  the  head,  and  kicked  him  into 
the  gutter.  For  those  are  fighting  words  indeed  in  that 
lovely  land. 

The  blame  for  the  fighting  is  evenly  divided.  On  the 
anniversary  of  the  Battle  of  the  Boyne  the  Orangemen  pa- 
rade with  the  whole  idea  of  insulting  their  Catholic  neigh- 
bors. They  sing:  — 

Teeter,  totter,  milk  and  water, 
Slaughter  the  Catholics  every  one; 
We  will  take  them  to  battle 
And  kill  them  like  cattle, 
And  pile  them  up  under 
The  Protestant's  drum. 

Of  course  preparation  has  been  duly  made  and  the  house- 
tops are  well  piled  with  cobblestones  and  brickbats.  The 
great  Linen  Thread  Works,  which  have  been  operated  by 
my  family  since  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  ex- 
pect to  close  down  for  a  few  days  twice  each  year  —  once 
after  the  anniversary  of  the  Battle  of  the  Boyne  and  again 
after  St.  Patrick's  Day. 

Father  told  a  story  which  well  illustrates  the  unbeliev- 
able agility  of  the  Hibernian  mind.  It  ran  something  like 
this:  — 

Ireland  is  a  rainy  country,  but  there  are  spells  of  dry 
weather.  At  such  times  an  elderly  retainer  was  employed 


*  'F(9r  Richer  for  Poorer  '  2  5 

to  bring  water  from  a  pond  near  by  for  the  garden  or  for 
sprinkling  the  driveway.  Father  asked  this  old  man  in  a 
bantering  way  what  capacity  his  cart  had.  The  old  man 
told  him.  "How  many  trips  do  you  have  to  make  in  the 
course  of  a  year?"  And  the  old  man  told  him  how  many. 
"Well,"  said  Father,  "I  have  a  sovereign  for  you  if  you 
can  figure  out  how  many  gallons  of  water  you  haul  from 
one  end  of  the  season  to  the  other."  "Oh,"  replied  the  old 
man,  "that's  too  easy.  I  haul  all  the  water  you  don't  see  in 
that  pond  there  now." 

We  are  inclined  to  laugh  at  the  Irish,  to  be  impatient 
with  them  sometimes,  but  deep  in  our  hearts  we  love  them 
and  admire  them  for  their  bravery,  their  loyalty,  their  love 
of  poetry  and  flowers,  their  kindness  to  animals,  and  their 
unfailingly  warm  hearts.  In  the  words  of  the  old  song, 
"Who  then  can  blame  us  if  Ireland  is  famous  for  murther 
and  whiskey  and  beauty  and  love?" 

After  our  visit  to  Ireland,  we  crossed  over  to  London 
for  a  few  days  before  taking  the  express  from  Calais  to 
Brindisi  to  catch  the  boat  for  Egypt.  At  London  I  went  to 
the  office  of  Thomas  Cook  and  bought  a  skeleton  ticket 
which  covered  a  good  many  of  the  inevitable  steamship 
runs,  such  as  Port  Said  to  Aden,  Aden  to  Bombay,  Calcutta 
to  Rangoon,  Yokohama  to  San  Francisco.  This  consisted 
of  a  mass  of  coupons  pinned  together  which  were  to  be 
exchanged  for  steamship  tickets.  These  coupons  I  inadvert- 
ently put  in  Rosamond's  trunk.  Then  this  trunk  caused  our 
first  marital  argument.  It  was  a  veritable  leviathan  of  a 
trunk.  I  have  never  seen  another  one  so  large.  I  said,  "Buy 
ten  little  trunks  that  can  be  easily  handled  and  let's  ship 
that  white  elephant  of  yours  home.'* 


26  Naturalist  at  Large 

Rosamond  finally  agreed.  Our  warm  clothing  and  heavy- 
overcoats,  which  we  had  needed  for  the  North  Atlantic 
crossing  and  were  not  likely  to  need  again,  and  sundry 
purchases  made  in  England  filled  it  up.  Father's  agents  in 
London  arranged  to  handle  its  transfer  to  Boston,  and  I 
mailed  the  key  about  two  hours  before  train  time.  Just  as 
we  were  ready  to  leave  for  the  station,  it  occurred  to  me 
that  all  those  coupons  were  in  the  trunk.  I  rushed  down- 
stairs in  a  frenzy.  In  the  old  Metropole  Hotel,  where  this 
affair  took  place,  there  was  a  letter  box  right  by  the  door 
of  the  elevator.  By  inexpressible  good  fortune  I  reached 
the  bottom  step  just  as  the  postman,  key  in  hand,  was  un- 
locking the  box.  I  spotted  the  letter  and  made  a  grab  for  it, 
pushed  a  half  sovereign  into  the  bewildered  postman's  palm, 
and  jumped  for  the  elevator.  Before  the  postman  could  yell 
"Stop  thief,"  I  had  the  key  extracted.  We  just  made  the 
train. 

By  nature  I  am  a  timorous  person.  Physical  bravery  is 
no  part  of  my  make-up  and  all  my  life  I  have  dodged  trou- 
ble rather  than  looked  for  it.  For  this  reason,  while  I  have 
traveled  a  good  deal,  I  have  few  adventures  to  recount. 
My  friends  often  counter  with  the  statement,  "But  you 
catch  poisonous  snakes  with  your  hands."  This,  of  course, 
is  only  partially  true.  You  need  the  right  sort  of  stick  and 
then,  when  you  know  how,  picking  up  snakes,  whether 
harmless  or  poisonous,  is  no  trick  at  all. 

My  wife  and  I,  however,  made  one  trip  in  1906  which 
for  some  reason  was  crowded  with  thrills.  A  family  friend, 
Sir  Frederick  Palmer,  Chief  Engineer  of  the  Port  of  Cal- 
cutta Authority,  gave  us  one  of  the  Survey  vessels  for  a 


'"'For  Richer  for  Poorer'  27 

trip  to  the  Sunderbunds.  At  certain  times  of  the  year, 
when  the  water  is  high,  the  shifting  sands  of  the  Hooghly 
River  make  it  necessary  to  revise  pilot  charts  every  few 
days,  and  a  number  of  vessels  are  constantly  employed  in 
this  work.  But  in  the  dry  season  they  are  not  so  busy,  and 
one  was  available  for  our  use. 

We  sailed  from  Calcutta  down  into  the  vast  network 
©f  waterways  which  make  up  the  double  delta,  for  the 
Hooghly  River  and  the  Brahmaputra  River  flow  into  the 
Bay  of  Bengal  near  together.  This  region,  called  the  Sun- 
derbunds, is  a  maze  of  islands,  and  at  low  water  each  of 
these  is  fringed  by  wide  marginal  flats  grown  with  grass 
and  bushes,  which  are  flooded  at  the  height  of  the  rainy 
season. 

On  these  open  maidans,  as  they  are  called,  the  axis  deer, 
or  chital,  swarm  at  night  to  graze.  Tigers  abound  and  feed 
on  the  chital,  and  there  is  an  abundance  of  wild  life  of 
other  sorts.  We  spent  several  nights  in  a  machan,  a  platform 
high  in  a  tree,  with  tethered  goat  for  bait.  We  wanted  to 
kill  a  tiser,  but  there  was  too  much  wild  food  about,  and 
while  we  saw  fresh  tracks  and  heard  tigers,  we  never  saw 
one. 

Late  one  morning,  after  we  had  slept  for  some  hours 
following  our  night's  vigil,  I  took  my  net  and  Rosamond 
her  box  of  papers,  and  we  set  to  collecting  butterflies. 
There  were  clumps  of  flowering  shrubs  three  or  four  feet 
high,  the  plants  looking  something  like  our  buttonbush.  A 
good  many  butterflies  were  coming  to  these  flowers,  and 
the  collecting  was  good.  A  boy  followed  us  with  my  dou- 
ble-barreled Manton  Express  rifle  on  his  shoulder.  I  looked 
back  to  speak  to  him  for  some  reason,  and  saw  that  he  had 


JS  Naturalist  at  Large 

disappeared.  Just  then  a  perfectly  magnificent  tiger  walked 
out  from  one  of  these  clumps  of  bushes  and  stalked  away- 
over  the  open  grass  as  if  he  were  crossing  a  lawn,  his  tail 
straight  in  the  air,  its  tip  flicking  from  side  to  side.  Since 
there  was  no  particular  object  in  running  away,  nor  any 
place  to  run  to,  we  stood  and  watched  him  walk  majes- 
tically out  of  sight  behind  another  thicket. 

A  few  days  later  the  captain  of  our  little  vessel  went 
out  with  us  to  get  some  snipe  for  the  pot.  We  got  widely 
separated,  and  I  heard  him  shoot  from  time  to  time,  but 
naturally  I  paid  no  particular  attention.  Later  on,  circling 
about  to  return  to  our  meeting  place,  I  heard  a  snort,  and 
a  giant  wild  boar  which  he  had  wounded  charged  me  on 
three  legs  with  an  unbelievable  alacrity.  I  realized,  how- 
ever, that  I  held  a  deadly  weapon  in  my  hand  if  I  only  shot 
straight.  I  waited  until  he  was  about  ten  feet  away  and  then 
put  a  charge  of  snipe-shot  straight  in  the  middle  of  his  fore- 
head. He  fell  dead  and  skidded  almost  to  my  feet.  The 
charge  of  shot  entered  his  skull  like  a  soHd  slug,  and  the 
pressure  on  his  brain  popped  out  both  his  eyes,  so  that  they 
hung  by  their  optic  nerves.  He  never  moved.  Then  our 
gunbearer  turned  out  to  be  a  Mohammedan,  so  I  had  to 
skin  out  the  saddle  and  hindquarters  and  carry  them  back 
to  the  boat.  Luckily  we  had  a  Hindu  cook  of  a  caste  which 
allowed  him  to  handle  pig.  In  due  season  we  dined  sump- 
tuously. 

The  third  event  —  and  mind  you,  all  this  happened  within 
ten  days  —  almost  ended  tragically.  I  was  standing  in  a  flat 
skiff  called  a  panchi,  the  butt  of  my  double-barreled  Ex- 
press rifle  resting  on  the  thwart  in  front  of  me.  The  search- 


'''For  Richer  for  Poorer''  29 

light  of  our  boat  played  on  a  group  of  chital,  and  I  was 
being  paddled  up  under  the  beam  of  light  with  the  idea 
of  shooting  one.  The  skiff  liit  a  submerged  stump,  and 
bounced  the  stock  of  the  heavy  gun  off  the  thwart.  As  it 
dropped,  the  hammers  caught.  The  weight  of  the  gun 
sprung  them  enough  to  fire  both  barrels. 

The  great  lead  slugs  passed  through  my  hands  as  they 
slid  off  the  barrel  of  the  gun,  burning  my  palms  badly,  and 
cut  the  brim  of  my  pith  helmet,  curiously  enough,  without 
knocking  it  off.  My  face  was  filled  with  black  powder 
grains.  I  sat  down,  considerably  shaken,  and  went  back  to 
the  boat,  where  my  wife  and  the  captain  helped  me  aboard. 
The  gun, was  badly  damaged,  so  there  was  nothing  to  do 
but  return  to  Calcutta,  which  we  did  at  once,  and  there 
Major  Camalliri,  surgeon  of  the  Coldstream  Guards,  picked 
the  powder  grains  out  of  my  face.  A  few  days'  rest  set 
everything  to  rights.  In  my  usual  hypochondriacal  way,  I 
wasted  a  lot  of  mental  energy  awaiting  tetanus,  but  in  due 
time  there  was  too  much  else  to  think  about  and  this  non- 
sense got  pushed  out  of  mind. 

While  Rosamond  and  I  were  resting  at  Darjeeling,  after 
I  had  pretty  nearly  blown  my  head  off  in  the  Sunderbunds, 
we  met  an  interesting  character,  a  Mr.  Mueller,  He  col- 
lected all  sorts  of  objects,  from  Tibetan  bronzes  to  butter- 
flies, and  was  in  touch,  by  correspondence,  with  museum 
directors  everywhere.  He  had  for  sale  some  of  the  ma- 
terial picked  up  by  members  of  the  Younghusband  expe- 
dition to  Lhasa,  and  Rosamond  proceeded  to  get  a  few 
mementos  of  our  visit. 

He  remarked  casually  to  me  that  this  was  the  season  of 


30  f  Naturalist  at  Large 

year  when  his  professional  butterfly  collectors  worked 
most  successfully.  These  men  were  Lepchas,  a  tribe 
of  hillmen  from  Bhutan  who  were  born  naturalists. 
I  had  often  heard  of  the  wonderful  variety  of  butter- 
flies to  be  found  in  the  deep  tropical  valley  of  the  Teesta 
River. 

The  upshot  was  that  he  agreed  to  hire  for  me  several 
of  his  very  best  collectors,  and  Amir  Hassein  immediately 
set  out  to  get  ponies  and  suppHes.  We  set  forth  early  one 
morning,  I  on  a  sturdy  gray  pony,  for  I  was  slender  and 
light  in  those  days.  Collecting  along  the  road  as  we  went, 
we  arrived  at  nightfall  at  the  Dak  Bungalow  near  the  bridge 
over  the  Teesta  River. 

On  this  trip  I  first  had  a  chance  to  see  really  fine,  high 
tropical  rain  forest.  I  also  had  my  first  sight  of  a  troop  of 
monal  pheasants  with  an  enormous  cock  leading  his  harem 
across  the  narrow  road  —  a  glittering  mass  of  metallic 
golden  bronze  and  green,  the  sun  striking  his  back  as  he 
moved  proudly  on  his  way.  He  certainly  topped  my  ex- 
perience observing  wild  life  up  to  that  moment. 

Then,  of  course,  there  were  many  other  birds,  jungle 
fowl,  and  other  species  of  pheasants,  and  lastly,  the  but- 
terflies. These  were  in  astonishing  variety.  The  Lepchas 
were  keen  as  mustard  and  extraordinarily  skillful  with  their 
long-handled  nets.  We  caught  and  papered  butterflies  until 
we  had  a  magnificent  collection. 

After  several  days  of  continuous  excitement  and  enjoy- 
ment we  returned  to  Darjeeling,  where  I  joined  Rosamond, 
who  was  waiting  for  me  there.  I  supplemented  the  collec- 
tion we  had  made  ourselves  with  material  purchased  from 
our  friend  Mr.  Mueller  and  sent  the  whole  collection  back 


"Fcr  Richer  for  Poorer' '  3 1 

to  the  Museum.  There,  by  the  most  inexcusable  careless- 
ness, it  was  mislaid  and  so  badly  eaten  by  Dermestes  that 
few  of  the  specimens  ever  finally  reached  the  collection. 

At  Lucknow,  in  India,  we  went  out  to  a  village  with  a 
friend  of  our  bearer,  Amir  Hassein.  This  friend  lived  in  a 
village  within  easy  driving  distance.  Amir  had  spoken  of 
the  fact  that  his  master  (meaning  me)  was  obviously  crazy, 
as  he  was  interested  in  snakes  and  other  loathsome  crea- 
tures. It  seemed  that  a  giant  cobra  lived  in  an  abandoned 
rodent  burrow  near  a  path  between  the  friend's  village  and 
a  stream  where  the  women  went  to  draw  water.  In  passing 
along  this  way  at  night,  because  it  was  cooler  then,  several 
people  had  trod  on  this  cobra.  Only  a  few  days  before,  a 
child  had  been  bitten  and  had  died. 

Now  of  course  they  could  not  kill  the  cobra.  You  re- 
member that  when  Buddha  was  asleep  under  the  Bo  tree, 
the  cobra  came  up  and  spread  its  hood  to  shade  his  sleep- 
ing eyes.  The  Master  blessed  the  cobra  then;  and  if  you 
don't  believe  it,  how  do  you  explain  the  fact  that  the  two 
finger  marks  are  to  be  seen  on  the  cobra's  hood?  So  nat- 
urally the  cobra  is  sacred,  and  no  native  was  going  to  risk 
his  prospects  of  the  hereafter  by  killing  it.  But  no  one 
cared  a  rap  about  my  chances  in  the  hereafter,  and  if  I 
killed  the  cobra,  so  much  the  better. 

We  trudged  out  across  the  dusty  plain  and  came  at  last 
to  the  little  hole  where  the  villagers  said  the  cobra  lived. 
I  had  an  old  entrenching  tool  which  I  used  to  dig  insects  out 
of  rotten  logs,  and  with  this  I  commenced  to  enlarge  the 
hole,  cutting  down  in  the  hard-baked  earth.  I  got  down 
about  a  foot  before  I  saw  what  was  obviously  skin  of  either 


32  Naturalist  at  Large 

a  lizard  or  a  snake.  I  strongly  suspected  snake.  I  gave  it  a 
poke  with  the  tip  of  my  digger  and  out  came  the  most 
magnificent  cobra  you  ever  saw. 

We  subsequently  preserved  any  number  of  them  for 
specimens,  but  none  so  "manner-gorgeous"  as  this  one.  It 
came  out,  reared  up,  its  beady  eyes  peering  from  side  to 
side  as  it  moved  its  head  inquiringly,  its  tongue  flashing. 
I  had  to  have  a  picture  of  it.  I  had  no  long-focus  camera  in 
those  days  and  I  wanted  a  picture  of  this  cobra  which 
would  fill  the  whole  plate.  I  got  it  (I  have  the  picture 
framed  on  my  wall  at  this  moment)  by  lying  down  on  the 
ground  and  edging  up  until  I  was  right  in  front  of  the 
snake.  My  wife  stood  by  with  an  open  parasol,  and  when 
he  saw  fit  to  make  a  nip  at  the  camera,  which  meant  com- 
ing pretty  close  to  my  face  and  hands,  she  would  lower 
the  parasol  in  front  of  him  and  he  would  sway  back  and 
straighten  up  again.  I  took  a  number  of  excellent  snapshots 
and  then  carefully  shot  the  snake  with  a  charge  of  dust-shot 
in  a  .38  cartridge  so  as  to  damage  him  as  little  as  possible. 

We  got  an  earthenware  jar  from  the  village  near  by, 
coiled  our  treasure  down  in  it,  and  went  back  to  Lucknow. 
Rosamond  refused  to  have  the  snake  in  our  room  because, 
as  she  wisely  maintained,  snakes  have  a  way  of  coming  to 
life  after  they  have  apparently  been  killed.  The  upshot  was 
that  a  jackal  sneaked  up  on  the  low  clay  porch  in  front 
of  the  room  and  carried  off  the  cobra  while  we  were  hav- 
ing supper.  But  I  still  have  the  photograph,  and  I  am  still 
just  as  convinced  as  I  was  then  that  I  am  fortunate  in 
having  a  wife  who  is  not  only  beautiful  but  brave.  I  had 
stepped  into  great  good  fortune. 


.  \* 


^^ 


i-«f  ♦■»■■ 


^    '.  * 


,«*,',• 


•Mi 


t.. 


^^'f^^-^'-^-i:^^. 


1'    7".    Bill  hour 


The  big  cobra  killed  near  Liicknow  on  the  fifteenth  of 

November,  1906 


''''For  Richer  for  Poorer''  33 

Forty  years  ago  India  was  a  travelers'  Mecca,  but  rela- 
tively few  thought  Burma  worth  more  than  a  glance.  They 
would  sail  from  Calcutta  to  Rangoon,  look  at  the  great 
pagoda,  rush  up  to  Mandalay  and  see  the  sights  of  the 
city,  interesting  enough  to  be  sure,  and  then  call  it  a  day 
and  move  on.  We  decided  to  do  a  Httle  differently. 

We  crossed  from  Calcutta  to  Mandalay  and  found  some- 
thing which  I  have  never  forgotten  and  which  really 
whetted  our  appetites  for  more.  This  was  not  Shwe-Dagon, 
astounding  as  that  great  temple  is,  but  rather  a  row  of  big 
trees  of  Amherstia  nobilis  encircling  the  lake  in  the  city 
park.  Amherstia  is  certainly  the  A  number  i  flowering 
tree  of  the  whole  world  and  this  is  its  homeland.  The  indi- 
vidual blossoms  look  like  tiny  hummingbirds  each  mounted 
on  a  slender  wire  and  all  tied  into  a  long  dropping  cord, 
so  that  the  dozen  or  more  little  birdlike  flowers  stick  out 
quite  evenly  in  all  directions.  The  individual  blooms  are 
scarlet  with  big  blobs  of  gold  symmetrically  placed  and 
as  sharply  defined  as  if  each  one  were  hand-painted.  The 
fohage  of  the  tree,  especially  the  new  shoots,  is  delicately 
tinted,  and  with  the  leaves  makes  up  a  combination  of 
color  and  form  which  is  superb.  After  driving  out  re- 
peatedly to  look  at  the  Amherstias,  we  decided  to  post- 
pone our  trip  to  Java,  where  we  had  a  real  job  to  do,  in 
order  to  see  a  little  more  of  this  fascinating  country.  For 
the  more  we  heard  of  it  the  more  we  wanted  to  see.  And 
naturally  we  took  time  to  watch  the  elephants  a-piUn'  teak 
and  all  that  sort  of  thing  while  we  were  making  plans.  Late 
one  afternoon  a  comfortable  train  landed  us  in  Mandalay, 
where  we  did  the  ordinary  sightseeing  of  palaces  and 
shrines.  Rosamond  reveled  in  the  silk  market  and  I  went 


34  Naturalist  at  Large 

snipe  shooting:  snipe  were  plentiful  in  the  rice  fields  and 
the  sport  was  excellent. 

Comfortable  and  reasonably  rapid  express  steamers  car- 
ried the  mails  from  Mandalay  to  the  head  of  navigation 
on  the  Irrawaddy,  and  on  these  most  of  the  few  visitors 
desiring  to  take  the  trip  usually  traveled.  We,  however, 
to  our  great  good  fortune,  found  that  the  Irrawaddy  Flotilla 
Company  was  planning  to  send  a  bazaar  boat  up  the  river 
in  a  few  days  and  that  this  would  offer  a  comfortable  and 
leisurely  way  to  see  this  long  stretch  of  water.  My  wife 
has  never  had  much  inclination  to  explore,  so  that  this  was  a 
compromise  proposition.  Because  I  have  had  few  trips  of 
this  sort,  this  pleasant  river  trip  probably  looms  larger  in 
my  memory  than  it  would  have  done  otherwise.  Never- 
theless, since  no  American  will  take  it  again  for  many  a 
long  day,  some  of  the  high  lights  may  be  worth  setting 
forth. 

The  boat  on  which  we  traveled  was  like  a  gigantic 
pumpkin  seed  with  a  great  stern  wheel.  She  had  a  fine 
upper  deck  giving  forward,  an  airy  dining  room  and  quite 
comfortable  cabins,  with  the  beds  well  screened.  She  was 
built  to  draw  very  little  water  because  the  river  Is  shallow 
and  the  bars  shift  constantly.  Lashed  alongside  was  an  even 
larger  flatboat  or  scow,  roofed  over  but  with  open  sides. 
On  this  great  barge  space  was  rented  out  to  merchants  who 
sold  almost  everything.  This  meant  that  we  traveled  slowly, 
did  not  run  at  night,  and  tied  up  at  innumerable  little  vil- 
lages where  the  people  on  shore  would  come  piling  down 
to  bargain  and  chaffer  with  the  merchants  on  board  the 
flat.  We  had  time  for  many  pleasant  walks  In  the  woods, 
for  opportunities  to  observe  birds  and  animals,  and  even 


*  ''For  Richer  for  Poorer' '  3  5 

the  chance  to  do  a  little  collecting  of  reptiles,  although 
the  season  was  unfavorably  dry.  Occasionally,  moreover, 
we  shot  ducks  to  vary  our  everlasting  diet  of  curry,  and 
we  did  pick  up  a  fair  number  of  lizards  and  the  like. 

Rosamond  had  a  regular  busman's  hoHday  when  we 
stopped  at  Thaybeitkyin,  which  is  the  river  port  for  Mogoc 
where  the  famous  ruby  fields  are  located.  Of  course  the 
officials  in  charge  of  the  mines  take  great  care  to  see  that 
bootlegging  of  rubies  does  not  take  place;  nevertheless, 
the  natives  are  very  shrewd  and  it  is  possible  to  pick  up 
tiny  but  lovely  colored  stones  at  low  rates.  And  this  place 
was  sufficiently  remote  so  that  there  was  little  danger  of 
having  imitation  stones  offered  to  us. 

We  stopped  in  many  strange  little  towns.  I  remember 
particularly  Mingoon,  where  there  is  the  largest  hanging  bell 
in  the  world.  (The  great  bell  in  Moscow  is  a  little  larger 
but  has  a  chunk  knocked  out  of  it  and  it  is  set  down  on 
the  pavement  in  the  city.)  The  great  bell  at  Mingoon  is 
about  two  feet  clear  of  the  ground  and  as  you  creep  under 
it  and  look  up  twelve  feet  or  more  into  the  beautiful  pol- 
ished inner  surface,  you  can  but  wonder  what  would  hap- 
pen if  it  dropped  while  you  were  inside.  In  the  East  great 
bells  are  usually  struck  with  staghorns  or  with  a  heavy 
billet  of  teakwood  hung  in  the  middle  with  a  tail  of  rope 
that  you  can  haul  back  and  then  let  go.  The  noise  is  not 
overwhelming  when  you  are  right  beside  the  bell,  but  it  is 
tremendously  impressive  at  the  distance  of  a  mile  or  so. 

One  day  while  sitting  on  the  lower  deck  —  and  this  was 
but  a  few  inches  above  the  water  level  —  away  out  ahead 
I  could  see  a  good-sized  snake  swimming  out  from  shore. 
I  figured  that  we  should  probably  meet  at  the  rate  we  both 


36  Naturalist  at  Large 

were  traveling.  I  seized  a  broom  handle  or  something  of 
the  sort  —  I  may  even  have  snatched  him  up  with  my 
hand  —  anyway  he  came  right  alongside  the  bow  as  we 
went  by  and  I  pitched  him  up  on  the  deck.  He  was  a  lovely 
iridescent  Burmese  python  about  seven  feet  long,  skin 
freshly  shed  and  an  ideal  size  to  preserve.  Most  specimens 
are  enormous  and  require  too  much  alcohol.  I  had  no  con- 
tainer on  board  which  would  hold  this  fellow,  so  I  put 
him  in  a  pillowcase  and  kept  him  in  my  room  until  we  got 
back  to  Mandalay.  Rarely  will  a  snake  strike  while  in  a 
bag  and  if  he  does  his  fine  needlelike  teeth  will  catch  in  the 
fabric  and  indeed  often  fetch  loose.  This  fellow  as  usual 
made  no  attempt  to  escape.  He  rests  in  the  museum  at 
Cambridge  to  this  day  as  a  souvenir  of  our  journey. 

I  think  that  the  most  amusing^  siojht  we  saw  was  one 
which  was  repeated  on  a  number  of  occasions.  This  was 
a  chance  to  watch  the  enormous  droves  of  macaque  mon- 
keys working  along  the  riverbank.  They  moved  slowly 
along,  industriously  turning  over  stones,  pulling  sticks  and 
logs  about,  the  old  individuals  appearing  very  serious,  while 
the  myriad  youngsters  gamboled  about  the  tree  tops  over 
the  heads  of  the  traveling  band.  Every  once  in  a  while  a 
young  monkey  would  come  down  and  sit  on  a  branch 
which  was  near  the  ground,  and  waiting  for  the  crowd 
to  pass  beneath  him  would  seize  one  of  the  elders  by  the 
tail  and  give  it  a  mighty  twitch.  This  would  set  all  hands 
to  scolding  and  bickering  and  chasing  one  another,  as 
punishment  was  passed  out  down  the  line. 

Once  we  saw  a  smallish  elephant  come  down  to  drink 
and  once  up  near  Katha  a  giant  cow.  This  big  elephant 
was  so  tame  and  paid  so  little  attention  to  our  clumsy- 


'''For  Richer  for  Poorer'  •        37 

looking  flotilla  that  I  thought  she  must  have  been  a  tame 
elephant  which  had  wandered  off  from  some  lumber  opera- 
tion. I  found  that  there  was  no  lumbering  going  on  in  the 
area  and  that  she  was  unquestionably  a  wild  animal  and 
a  very  fine  one  to  boot.  Birds  were  a  great  source  of  in- 
terest —  pigeons  and  paraquets  especially  —  and  the  occa- 
sional pairs  of  hornbills  crossing  the  river  were  always  im- 
pressive. Their  heavy  wing  beats  were  accompanied  by  a 
noise  like  the  puffing  of  a  locomotive  on  a  heavy  grade  a 
mile  or  so  away. 

In  most  of  the  villages  there  were  little  monasteries 
where  the  yellow-robed  Buddhist  monks  ran  what  might  be 
called  their  parochial  schools,  and  of  course  these  people 
never  killed  anything.  Hence  the  great  Tokkay  geckos 
which  lived  in  the  thatched  roofs  were  always  undisturbed. 
Sometimes  the  monks  frowned  upon  our  catching  these 
lizards  to  preserve  them,  albeit  not  very  actively.  We 
learned  that  the  gentle  monks  sitting  around  in  the  evening 
would  make  pools  and  gamble  moderately  on  the  number 
of  times  that  these  lizards  would  call,  for  their  name  "Tok- 
kay" is  taken  from  the  sound  which  they  make,  and  it  is 
usually  repeated  from  five  to  nine  times  at  each  bout  of 
singing. 

The  trip  ended  at  Bhamo,  where  the  caravans  outfitted 
and  loaded  up  to  carry  the  goods  of  British  India  to  Teng- 
yueh  or  Talifu  in  China.  We  were  impressed  by  the  hand- 
some mules  and  by  the  singularly  good-looking  muleteers, 
for  these  Chinese  were  tall  and  sturdy.  They  were  well 
dressed  in  blue  and  their  queues,  which  they  all  wore  in 
those  days,  reached  down  almost  to  their  heels.  The  people 
around  Bhamo  are  not  Burmese  but  Kachins,  a  primitive 


38  Naturalist  at  Large 

folk,  picturesque,  rather  offish,  and  dressed  gaily  in  red 
and  blue.  We  succeeded  in  getting  some  of  their  swords 
and  other  artifacts  for  the  Peabody  Museum.  After  leav- 
ing Bhamo  we  slipped  downstream,  the  current  carrying 
us  along  quite  quickly,  and  in  a  few  days  were  back  again 
in  Mandalay. 

This  excursion  had  proved  so  enjoyable  and  to  our  no- 
tion so  instructive  that  we  decided  to  try  one  more  Bur- 
mese expedition.  We  had  heard  of  the  Gokteik  Gorge.  This 
was  to  be  reached  by  the  railroad  which  runs  out  into  the 
Shan  states.  It  is  from  the  end  of  this  railroad  that  the 
Burma  Road  runs.  We  went  first  to  Mamyio,  a  pleasant  hill 
station,  and  then  on  to  the  gorge  where  there  was  a  ddk 
bungalow,  just  a  short  distance  before  the  railway  ended 
at  Lashio.  The  last  stage  of  the  journey  was  made  in  a 
somewhat  primitive  railroad  coach:  I  remember  finding 
the  sliding  door  which  led  into  the  wasliroom  completely 
covered,  and  I  mean  loo  per  cent  covered,  with  the  largest 
and  most  ablebodied  cockroaches  I  have  ever  seen.  They 
scattered  about  when  they  were  disturbed  but  before  long 
crawled  back  and  took  up  their  old  roosting  places. 

The  extremely  deep  Gokteik  Gorge  through  which  a 
stream  ran  was  very  narrow  and  the  cliffs  which  formed 
its  walls  were  so  close  together,  and  both  "slantindicular" 
in  the  same  direction,  that  the  effect  was  just  like  being  in 
a  cave.  We  looked  up  and  saw  no  sky.  Here  there  was  an 
enormous  colony  of  cave  swifts  of  the  genus  Collocalia, 
a  genus  abundant,  widespread,  multitudinous  in  species, 
and  distributed  all  over  southeastern  Asia  and  the  islands. 
It  is  from  one  species  of  the  genus,  in  the  East  Indies,  that 
the  nests  made  of  the  swifts'  dried  saliva  are  gathered  to 


*  'For  Richer  for  Poorer  '  3  9 

make  Chinese  bird's-nest  soup.  The  owning  and  leasing 
of  these  caves  is  native  high  finance. 

The  country  about  us  swarmed  with  game.  Tracks  of 
bear,  deer,  and  leopard  were  literally  everywhere.  I  asked 
my  bearer  to  gather  some  beaters  and  we  tried  a  drive, 
but  since  the  vegetation  was  so  thick  and  since  we  could 
post  only  one  watcher,  myself,  there  was  only  a  small 
chance  that  whatever  game  they  moved  would  come  in 
sight.  Plenty  of  game  was  moved  —  of  that  there  was  no 
doubt,  as  I  could  hear  both  it  and  the  excited  shouts  of  our 
beaters.  Unfortunately  we  saw  nothing. 

From  the  bungalow  everything  which  went  on  in  the 
neighborhood,  however,  could  certainly  be  heard.  It  was 
a  little  building  set  up  on  high  posts  with  a  good  roof  but 
more  or  less  open  on  all  sides.  I  knew  well  the  inordinate 
racket  made  by  peacocks  where  they  were  really  common, 
for  I  had  heard  them  abundantly  in  Jeypore  in  India.  This 
was  just  another  place  where  the  constant  noise  made  by 
the  peacocks  was  well  reinforced  by  numbers  of  jungle 
fowl.  These  wild  chickens  would  crow  in  the  morning 
with  high,  shrill  calls  like  those  of  leghorns  multiplied  a 
hundredfold;  all  these  birds  saw  to  it  that  there  was  no 
oversleeping.  We  got  butterflies  and  some  other  insects  but 
our  Burmese  collections  were  by  no  means  outstanding. 
We  were  just  loafing  and  enjoying  ourselves  to  the  very 
fullest. 

I  shall  always  think  of  this  country  in  vivid  contrast  to 
India.  When  we  were  there,  the  people  were  singularly 
friendly.  The  wide  variety  of  gay  costumes  worn  by  Shans, 
Kerens,  Kachins,  and  Burmese  made  up  a  satisfying  va- 
riety. The  Burmese  young  men  and  girls  were  especially 


40  Naturalist  at  Large 

gay  and  attractive  to  look  at.  I  am  sure  the  universal  land 
clearing  has  greatly  changed  those  gloriously  forested 
banks. 

The  variety  of  native  craft  both  rowed  and  propelled 
by  sail  was  a  constant  source  of  interest.  Some  of  the  boats 
were  beautifully  decorated  and  wonderfully  carved.  Enor- 
mous rafts  of  teak  would  come  down  the  river,  each  with 
a  whole  encampment  of  rivermen  housed  on  their  artificial 
island.  Every  log  of  teak  was  made  to  float  by  having 
bundles  of  giant  dry  bamboos  lashed  fast  to  its  length. 
These  rafts  made  running  at  night  difficult  and  dangerous. 

Today  Rangoon  is  a  ruined  city,  as  is  also  Mandalay. 
It  must  have  been  impossible  to  bombard  and  to  bomb 
these  towns  without  destroying  their  superb  examples  of 
old  Burmese  architecture,  with  the  gorgeous  teakwork 
carvings  and  the  strangely  ornate  roofs.  Gone  too  must  be 
the  myriad  pagodas,  ranging  in  size  from  lovely  little  ala- 
baster structures,  which  were  to  be  found  literally  by 
hundreds  around  Mandalay,  to  the  great  Shwe-Dagon 
at  Rangoon.  This  temple,  plated  with  gold  from  top  to 
bottom,  looked  as  high  as  the  Washington  Monument, 
though  I  suppose  it  was  not.  Forty  years  ago  Burma  was  a 
land  of  romance  and  charm.  It  is  a  pity  that  war  had  to 
come  to  it. 


CHAPTER  V 

Wallace  and  the  Dutch  East 


I 


N  MY  pocket  at  the  start  of  our  journey  I  had  the  best 
of  all  passports  to  the  Dutch  East  Indies.  It  was  a  letter 
of  introduction  from  Mr.  Agassiz  to  Dr.  Treub,  the  fa- 
mous botanist,  head  of  the  Gardens  at  Buitenzorg  and 
Minister  of  Agriculture.  After  our  mild  zoological  ad- 
ventures in  India  and  Burma,  we  finally  fetched  up  in 
Batavia.  Major  Ouwens,  the  charming  and  friendly  direc- 
tor of  the  Zoological  Museum  in  the  Buitenzorg  Gardens, 
passed  the  word  along,  and  all  day  streams  of  men  and 
boys  — and  girls  too,  for  that  matter  — Uned  up  either  at 
the  museum  or  at  our  lodgings  near  by  with  hollow  joints 
of  giant  bamboo  carefully  plugged  with  wads  of  grass  and 
leaves.  Each  contained  a  treasure  —  snakes  of  countless 
sorts,  frogs,  toads,  lizards,  insects,  and  fishes.  We  pickled 
and  shipped  unceasingly.  I  had  been  for  a  long  time  sur- 
reptitiously learning  Malay,  so  that  when  I  reached  Java 
I  could  bicker  and  bargain,  and  consequently  acquired  a 
great  collection  very  reasonably. 

We  had  some  weeks  on  our  hands  in  Batavia  before  the 
trim  little  steamship  BotJo  made  one  of  her  three-a-year 
voyages  to  the  eastern  islands  of  the  far-flung  empire  of 
Insulindia.  After  deep  cogitation,  we  had  picked  out  this 
voyage  as  offering  a  chance  to  see  the  greatest  number  of 
locaHties  mentioned  by  Wallace.  There  were  numberless 
voyages  to  choose  from,  as  the  little  steamers  of  the  K.P.M. 


42  Naturalist  at  Large 

(Koninklijke  Paketvaart  Maatschappij)  poked  their  noses 
in  and  out  of  scores  upon  scores  of  out-of-the-way  har- 
bors. Finally,  on  January  24,  1907,  we  set  forth. 

Our  passage  was  leisurely,  loading  and  unloading  was 
slow,  and  there  were  always  letters  to  be  waited  for  or 
merchants  whose  affairs  dragged  on,  as  always  when  one  is 
dealing  with  Orientals.  First  came  Bali,  a  very  different  Bali 
from  the  island  as  it  is,  or  was  a  short  time  ago.  The  Dutch 
had  just  conquered  it,  and  the  natives  were  still  pretty  well 
unpacified.  Then  Lombok,  chiefly  memorable  as  producing 
a  new  toad  which  I  named  Biifo  cavator.  Then  Macassar, 
Buru,  Ambon,  Ceram,  Obi,  and  lovely  Ternate. 

Here  came  a  real  thrill,  for  I  was  stopped  in  the  street 
one  day  as  my  wife  and  I  were  preparing  to  climb  up  to 
the  Crater  Lake.  With  us  were  Ah  Woo  with  his  butterfly 
net,  Indit  and  Bandoung,  our  well-trained  Javanese  col- 
lectors, with  shotguns,  cloth  bags,  and  a  vasculum  for  car- 
rying the  birds.  We  were  stopped  by  a  wizened  old  Malay 
man.  I  can  see  him  now,  with  a  faded  blue  fez  on  his  head. 
He  said,  "I  am  Ali  Wallace."  I  knew  at  once  that  there 
stood  before  me  Wallace's  faithful  companion  of  many 
years,  the  boy  who  not  only  helped  him  collect  but  nursed 
him  when  he  was  sick.  We  took  his  photograph  and  sent 
it  to  Wallace  when  we  got  home.  He  wrote  me  a  delightful 
letter  acknowledging  it  and  reminiscing  over  the  time 
when  Ali  had  saved  his  life,  nursing  him  through  a  terrific 
attack  of  malaria.  This  letter  I  have  managed  to  lose,  to  my 
eternal  chagrin. 

The  voyage  continued  all  the  way  around  the  great 
spidery  mass  of  the  island  of  Helmahera,  one  of  the  love- 
liest in  all  the  world.  The  only  rough  night  I  remember 


The  women's  canoe  with  no  outrigger,  only  used  on  short 

journeys 


1' hot  us  bv  R.  P.  Barbour 


The  men's  canoe,  used  for  trips  to  sea.  Humboldt  Bay,  1907 


Wallace  and  the  Dutch  East  43 

was  when  we  anchored  way  offshore  at  Supu  Bay.  I  had 
been  told  that  we  should  catch  the  mischief  there,  but 
slept  on  deck  as  usual  and  mighty  nearly  got  rolled  over- 
board before  I  woke  to  what  was  going  on.  Actually  I  al- 
most rolled"  into  our  meat  supply.  Since  we  had  no  refrig- 
eration, this  came  on  board  on  the  hoof  in  Bah  and  stood 
in  a  row,  tied  to  the  ship's  rail.  Hitched  to  the  other  rail 
were  the  Orang  nanti  (the  Chain  People,  prisoners  of 
war),  shackled  together.  They  had  been  captured  by  the 
Dutch  in  the  Achinese  war  in  Sumatra  and  were  going  to 
build  roads  in  Ceram.  The  fact  that  the  beef  had  to  be 
butchered  on  deck  —  and  there  was  not  very  much  deck 
at  that  — meant  that  my  wife  sat  sewing  in  the  opposite 
direction,  so  to  speak,  waited  till  she  heard  the  hose  which 
washed  the  gurry  overboard,  and  then  turned  about  to 
find  the  table  being  set  up.  The  ship's  officers  and  the  three 
or  four  passengers  on  board  all  ate  together  on  the  open 
deck.  There  was  no  ice  aboard:  our  meat  was  fresh  for 
just  one  day. 

The  absence  of  ice  made  photography  difficult.  The  film 
of  thirty  years  ago  softened  easily  and  disintegrated  in 
warm  water.  Fresh  water  on  the  ship  was  coolest  late  at 
night,  so  that  is  when  we  had  to  develop  our  pictures.  Some 
were  lost,  but  luckily  we  saved  the  best  of  them  by  putting 
a  little  formalin  in  the  water  to  harden  the  film. 

At  Ternate  w^e  were  boarded  by  a  Mr.  Sedee,  who  had 
agents  in  numberless  little  outposts  and  who  dealt  in  rat- 
tan, dammar  gum,  and  bird-of-paradise  plumes.  He  was  a 
mine  of  information  —  knew  all  about  Wallace,  though  he 
had  never  actually  seen  him.  And  he  said  one  day,  "To- 
morrow we  land  in  Ake  Selaka  and  there  fives  Mr.  Duiven- 


44  Naturalist  at  Large 

boden."  The  next  day  we  found  Mr.  Duivenboden  and 
were  introduced.  He  was  dressed  in  immaculate  white, 
spoke  perfect  Enghsh.  His  father  had  been  Wallace's  host 
and  his  mother  a  Javanese  lady:  as  a  small  boy  he  had  seen 
Wallace  and  remembered  him.  He  took  me  into  the  woods, 
sat  beside  me  on  a  giant  fallen  log,  and  whistled  in  a  pe- 
culiar way.  In  a  few  moments,  hopping  down  the  long 
snaky  trunk  of  a  climbing  palm,  appeared  a  bizarre-look- 
ing brown  bird.  Here  was  I,  sitting  at  the  very  spot  where 
Wallace  had  collected  the  extroardinary-looking  bird  of 
paradise  which  bears  his  name.  Wallace  speaks  of  the  elder 
Duivenboden  as  the  scion  of  "an  ancient  Dutch  family,  but 
who  was  educated  in  England  and  speaks  our  language  per- 
fectly." He  was  a  very  rich  man,  possessed  many  ships 
and  more  than  a  hundred  slaves.  "He  was,  moreover,  well 
educated  and  fond  of  literature  and  science  —  a  phenome- 
non in  these  regions." 

The  next  day  at  Galela,  a  neighboring  village  and  the 
seat  of  a  rather  cocky  ruler,  as  it  turned  out,  I  went  shoot- 
ing at  dawn.  The  island  fairly  swarmed  with  parrots,  lories, 
and  cockatoos  of  all  sorts.  I  saw  a  giant  cockatoo  in  the 
top  of  a  tall  tree.  I  shot  it.  Down  it  came,  fluttering  and 
flapping  through  the  foliage,  to  fall  at  my  feet.  I  picked 
it  up  and,  to  my  utter  astonishment,  dangling  from  its  leg 
was  about  eighteen  inches  of  gilt  chain.  Of  course,  it  had 
to  belong  to  the  Rajah  —  a  favorite  pet  which  had  escaped 
that  morning.  There  was  the  devil  to  pay.  I  paid  a  con- 
siderable amount  of  hush  money,  and  I  never  even  got  the 
bird. 

We  had  a  little  launch  on  board,  called  by  the  Malays 
"Child  of  the  Fireboat"   {Ajiak  Kapal  Apt).  When  we 


Wallace  and  the  Dutch  East  45 

were  anchored  near  shore  and  she  was  not  needed  to  tow 
cargo  lighters,  we  were  generously  allowed  to  use  her.  In 
her  we  explored  the  rivers  and  bays  which  studded  this 
extraordinarily  indented  coastline.  The  Kali  Weda  ran  in- 
land, twisting  and  turning  for  a  good  many  miles  behind 
the  town  of  Weda.  The  forest  here  was  sumptuously  mag- 
nificent —  great  masses  of  pandans  and  canes  and  bamboos 
along  the  banlc,  and  then  the  high  woods.  At  times  the  little 
river  ran  through  a  green  tunnel.  We  could  hear  pigs  and 
deer  crashing  in  the  underbrush,  but  never  got  sight  of 
them. 

What  we  did  get,  however,  were  some  enormous  lizards 
—  they  were  three  feet  long  —  with  a  great  fanlike  sail  on 
their  backs  and  tails,  like  Permian  Pelycosaurs  in  miniature. 
To  my  joy,  on  coming  home,  I  found  that  this  creature 
was  entirely  unknown,  and  I  named  it  for  Professor  Max 
Weber  of  Holland,  who  had  shown  a  kindly  interest  in 
our  journey  {Hydrosaiinis  iveber'i).  I  cannot  for  the  life 
of  me  understand  how  Wallace  missed  finding  this  crea- 
ture. We  took  it  at  Piru  in  Ceram  as  well  as  here,  and  it 
was  conspicuously  different  from  allies  known  from  the 
Philippines  and  Amboina.  It  is  hard  to  convey  to  a  person 
who  is  not  a  naturahst  by  profession  the  extraordinary  feel- 
ing of  satisfaction  which  overwhelms  one  at  handling  a 
great,  conspicuous  creature  which  has  hitherto  eluded 
notice  by  one's  colleagues. 

Fortunately,  we  approached  New  Guinea  through  the 
narrow  passage  between  Batanta  and  Salawatti  rather  than 
through  the  more  ample  Dampier  Strait  which  afforded 
Wallace  approach,  but  he  was  sailing  in  a  schooner.  We 
had  steam  and  could  buck  the  swift  current,  albeit  slowly. 


46  Naturalist  at  Large 

Wallace  said,  as  he  drew  near,  "I  looked  with  intense  in- 
terest on  those  rugged  mountains,  retreating  ridge  behind 
ridge  into  the  interior,  where  the  foot  of  civilized  man  had 
never  trod.  There  was  the  country  of  the  cassowary  and 
the  tree  kangaroo,  and  those  dark  forests  produce  the  most 
extraordinary  and  the  most  beautiful  of  the  feathered  in- 
habitants of  the  earth  —  the  varied  species  of  the  bird  of 
paradise."  Wallace  was  not  given  to  hyperbolic  expres- 
sion, for  he  had  been  collecting  commercially  in  the  Indies 
for  years  before  he  approached  Papua,  and  had  had  his 
senses  somewhat  benumbed  by  a  long  stay  in  Amazonia 
before  that. 

Think,  then,  what  were  the  feelings  of  a  youngster  just 
of  age,  whose  previous  tropical  experience  had  been  a  single 
voyage  to  the  Bahamas  and  something  of  India  and  Burma 
on  the  way  east.  As  we  moved  slowly  through  the  strait, 
with  the  billowing  mountains  of  green  near  at  hand,  the 
little  villages  of  thatched  huts  borne  on  high  stilts  by  the 
Waterside,  catamarans  and  sailing  prows  constantly  moving 
along  the  shore,  I  was  completely  overcome.  I  am  ridicu- 
lously emotional  by  nature,  and  when  the  first  mate,  who 
stood  beside  me  in  the  bow,  pointed  ahead  and  said,  "That 
is  Papoea,"  as  the  Dutch  call  New  Guinea,  a  lump  which 
I  could  hardly  swallow  came  in  my  throat. 

Then  followed  unforgettable  days  indeed.  Sorong  pro- 
duced a  spiny  anteater  which  we  kept  alive  and  were  able 
to  observe.  A  dish  of  ground  coconut  soon  accumulated 
enough  ants,  which  we  thought  would  keep  it  happy.  They 
didn't,  and  I  am  quite  sure  now  its  principal  food  is  earth- 
worms and  not  insects.  The  great,  bird-winged  butterflies 
of  the  genus  Ornithoptera  were  abundant.  They  flew  so 


Ilioto  b\    A.   p.   Ba>hoi 

The  Great  Karriwarri  at  Tubadi  Milage,  Humboldt  Bay, 

New  Guinea 


Wallace  and  the  Dutch  East  47 

high  that  we  shot  them  with  dust-shot  and  got  a  good 
series,  which  satisfied  us  entirely  until  we  found  a  lot  of 
pupae,  which  we  strung  up  against  the  curtains  of  a  vacant 
stateroom.  Here  they  emerged,  and  we  got  perfect  speci- 
mens. 

On  to  Doreh  Bay,  Wallace's  old  headquarters.  I  sent  him 
photographs  of  the  natives  here  and  he  wrote  me  that  he 
was  sorry  I  had,  for  he  disliked  them  so.  They  may  not 
have  been  friendly  to  him,  but  they  were  to  us  in  1907, 
and  went  with  us  into  the  forest.  On  every  fallen  log  beau- 
tiful metallic  weevils  swarmed,  just  as  they  had  in  Wal- 
lace's day,  and  we  had  unbelievably  good  collecting.  I  came 
back  to  the  ship  one  afternoon,  Rosamond  having  been 
left  on  board,  and  found  that  she  had  done  something  for 
me  which  touched  me  greatly.  A  native  had  brought  aboard 
a  big  green  snake  about  four  feet  long,  hitched  by  rattan 
fore  and  aft  to  a  piece  of  stick.  She  purchased  the  snake 
for  a  stick  of  tobacco  and  a  small  mirror  and  then,  feeling 
that  it  might  get  away,  opened  the  top  of  our  big  alcohol 
tank,  cut  the  snake  loose  from  the  stick,  and  herself  forced 
the  reptile  into  the  pickle.  She  firmly  believed  that  the 
snake  was  a  poisonous  one.  It  was  not,  but  hers  was  a  brave 
and  kindly  act,  since  she  loathes  snakes  as  much  as  most 
people  do.  And  she  had  garnered  the  first  specimen  of 
Chondropytho7i  viridis,  which  had  certainly  never  before 
been  collected  by  an  American. 

By  an  arrangement  with  the  K.P.M.  authorities  in  Sura- 
baya, we  were  allowed  to  delay  the  itinerary  of  the  Both 
for  a  very  reasonable  indemnity.  This,  and  the  fact  that 
Mr.  Sedee  had  much  trading  to  do,  gave  us  a  chance  to 
see  a  good  many  points  of  interest  along  the  north  coast 


48  Naturalist  at  Large 

of  New  Guinea,  among  them  Windessi,  where  Mr.  Van 
Balen  had  been  immured  as  a  missionary  for  years.  He  and 
Mr.  Van  Hasselt,  located  on  Mansinam  Island  in  Doreh 
Bay,  were  the  only  Dutchmen  in  New  Guinea  at  that 
time.  Van  Hasselt  had  tried  to  translate  the  Bible  into 
Numfoor,  the  most  widely  spoken  of  the  Papuan  idioms. 

A  knowledge  of  Hawaiian  will  carry  you  from  Hono- 
lulu through  all  the  Polynesian  Islands  to  New  Zealand 
with  only  a  few  consonantal  changes,  but  most  languages 
in  New  Guinea  won't  carry  you  across  the  street,  since 
almost  every  village  speaks  its  own  tongue.  I  understand 
Mr.  Van  Hasselt  had  to  give  up  his  task  because  the  presen- 
tation of  abstract  ideas  in  Numfoor  was  utterly  impossible. 
I  report  this,  however,  on  hearsay. 

Pom,  Wooi,  and  Ansus  were  the  towns  we  visited  on 
Japen  Island.  Here  the  natives  were  distinctly  non-co-opera- 
tive and  Ah  Woo  would  not  go  on  shore,  saying  that  too 
many  Chinese  had  been  eaten  there  in  the  past.  We  did 
try  a  landing  at  the  little  town  of  Meosbundi  on  Wiak 
Island,  but  when  we  went  ashore  and  tried  to  buy  some 
drums  and  other  objects  for  the  Peabody  Museum,  we 
saw  the  women  sneaking  off  into  the  thick  bush  and  climb- 
ing away  up  into  their  httle  houses  set  up  fifty  or  sixty 
feet  above  the  ground.  The  first  officer  allowed  that  this 
was  a  bad  sign  and  we  had  better  pull  out.  And  we  did, 
quite  obviously  just  in  time,  for  a  cohort  of  yelling,  mop- 
headed  natives  thronged  the  beach.  Perhaps  they  were 
simply  showing  ofT,  but  the  officers  of  the  ship  had  no 
desire  to  encounter  the  inquiry  which  would  perforce  have 
been  held  had  we  been  killed,  even  though  we  had  signed 
waivers  of  responsibility  before  we  left  Java. 


„^Sif«*«-*>-- 


Two  Karriwarris  at  the  village  of  Tubadi  in  Humboldt  Bay 


Plwto  bv  R.   P.   Barbour 


Communal  long  houses  over  the  water  at  Ansus,  Japen  Island, 
in  Geelvink  Bay,  Dutch  New  Guinea 


Wallace  and  the  Dutch  East  49 

We  pushed  on  to  Humboldt  Bay,  now  Fort  Hollandia 
and  the  base  which  Richard  Archbold  used  for  the  great 
aeroplane  which  in  1938  carried  his  expedition  to  the 
mountain  lakes.  Sir  John  Murray,  the  oceanographer,  told 
me  that  when  the  ship  Challenger  visited  Humboldt  Bay 
in  February  1873,  it  was  absolutely  impossible  to  land.  The 
natives  met  them  with  such  showers  of  arrows  that  they 
sailed  away.  We  landed  on  Metu  Debi  Island  in  the  mouth 
of  the  bay  amid  swarms  of  natives.  We  found  them  stark 
naked  but,  on  the  whole,  quite  jolly  and  congenial.  They 
were  a  little  short-tempered  if  they  were  crossed,  as,  for 
instance,  when  they  somewhat  indiscreetly  wanted  to  see 
whether  my  wife  was  white  all  over.  She  was  the  first 
white  woman  they  had  ever  seen.  In  fact,  we  were  so  com- 
pletely disassociated  with  their  idea  of  human  beings  that 
not  only  at  Djamna,  but  here  in  the  village  of  Tubadi, 
she  was  allowed  to  enter  the  Karriwaris,  where  the  sacred 
paraphernaha  are  stored.  Native  women,  under  pain  of 
death,  are  forbidden  to  enter  there. 

These  people  were  most  bizarre  in  appearance.  The 
women  were  buxom  and  not  unpleasing  in  mien;  they 
wore  a  short  skirt  of  beaten  bark  shrunk  about  their  waists 
while  the  bark  was  wet  and  allowed  to  dry  there.  In  their 
ears  were  several  dozen  rings  made  of  tortoise  shell,  about 
four  inches  in  diameter.  The  whole  ear  margin  was  pierced 
with  a  row  of  holes.  Their  heads  were  covered  with  little 
braids  of  hair,  each  weighted,  to  hold  it  in  place,  with  a 
tiny  ball  of  dried  clay. 

The  men  wore  bands  of  fiber  tightly  bound  around  their 
arms.  In  these  were  stuck  flowers  or  bunches  of  brightly 
colored  leaves,  and  often  also  a  dagger,  made  of  a  casso- 


50  Naturalist  at  Large 

wary's  thighbone  or  a  human  thighbone,  chipped  to  a 
point.  Many  carried  stone  axes,  and  almost  all  had  bows 
and  bundles  of  arrows.  We  photographed  their  arrow  re- 
lease for  Professor  E.  S.  Morse,  who  was  studying  the 
evolution  of  archery.  In  their  noses  they  wore  the  tusks  of 
wild  boars,  one  pushed  up  through  the  nostril  and  through 
a  hole  pierced  in  the  side  of  the  nose  on  each  side,  a  sort 
of  glorified  Kaiser's  mustache,  quite  striking  when  seen 
from  a  distance.  They  wore  their  hair  in  great,  luxuriant 
mops,  with  a  comb  stuck  in  it.  This  was  made  from  the 
spiny,  coarse  wing  feathers  of  the  cassowary  and  was  used 
to  keep  the  hair  fluffed  out  symmetrically.  They  not  in- 
frequently wore  a  band  around  their  brows  decorated  with 
hibiscus  or  other  flowers.  They  either  wore  no  clothes  at 
all  or  bizarrely  shaped  little  gourds  decorated  with  patterns 
burned  on  them,  in  which  a  small  round  hole  was  cut.  All 
in  all,  they  were  highly  satisfactory  savages  and  looked 
just  as  they  should  have. 

Rosamond  and  I  have  been  to  the  Island  of  Amboina 
twice,  for  the  Both  stopped  there  for  several  days  on  the 
way  to  New  Guinea  and  on  the  return  voyage.  We  went 
out  to  Batu  Gadja  to  see  the  tomb  of  old  Rumphius,^  whose 

^For  anyone  who  may  be  interested,  I  can  recommend 
Professor  George  Sarton's  fascinating  biographical  sketch  of 
Rumphius,  who  went  to  Java  in  1653  and  to  Amboina  the  next 
year.  His  drawings  were  lost  there  in  a  disastrous  fire  on  Janu- 
ary 1 1,  1687,  but  his  manuscript  was  saved.  Luckily,  Governor 
General  Camphuys  had  this  copied  before  he  sent  it  to  Holland, 
since  the  ship  Waterla?zd,  carrying  the  original  manuscript  to 
the  homeland,  was  sunk  by  the  French.  Rumphius  continued 
his  work  until  May  1670,  when  he  completely  lost  his  eyesight. 


Wallace  and  the  Dutch  East  51 

A?72bonsche  Rariteitkamer,  published  in  1705,  first  made 
known  to  the  world  the  natural  wonders  of  the  Moluccas. 

A  queer  old  hermit  of  a  Frenchman  lived  up  in  the 
forest  not  far  from  where  Rumphius  was  buried.  He  made 
a  precarious  livelihood  selling  natural-history  objects  to 
museums  hither  and  yon.  We  got  a  lot  of  interesting  things 
from  him,  including  a  fine  batch  of  cocoons  of  the  local 
bird-winged  butterfly,  a  giant  species,  black  and  metallic 
velvety  green,  related  to  one  we  had  taken  in  New  Guinea 
and  which  flew  so  high,  here  in  Amboina,  that  we  had  no 
luck  collecting  specimens.  We  pinned  up  the  cocoons  in  a 
vacant  stateroom,  separate  from  such  others  as  we  had 
secured  so  that  there  would  be  no  mixing  of  localities, 
and  long  before  we  were  back  in  Java  they  had  emerged 
and  are  all  now  safely  pinned  out  in  the  collection  here  in 
Cambridge. 

There  was  a  cave  in  the  hills  not  far  from  this  same  spot. 
This  yielded  a  few  bats  of  families  poorly  represented  in 
American  collections.  But  the  exciting  high  light  of  our 
visit  to  Amboina  was,  of  all  things,  an  eel.  In  1887  the 
Reverend  B.  G.  Snow  sent  some  fishes  to  the  Agassiz  Mu- 
seum from  Ebon  in  the  Marshall  Islands.  Amongst  these 
was  a  single  specimen  of  an  extraordinary  eel  with  curious 
extensions  to  its  nostrils  like  folded  leaves  sticking  far  out 


He  worked  on,  helped  by  friends,  and  finally  died  on  the  fif- 
teenth of  June  1702.  He  left  two  great  manuscripts,  the  one  I 
have  mentioned  and  the  Herbarmm  Amboinense,  neither  of 
which  was  published  until  after  his  death.  Rumphius  was  one 
of  the  great  naturalists  of  the  seventeenth  century  and  he  de- 
serves to  be  better  known.  Sarton's  brief  account  of  his  life 
was  written  in  his  for  August  1937,  and  a  longer  and  a  more  - 
elaborate  biography  will  some  day  be  forthcoming.  ^v 


52  Naturalist  at  Large 

in  front  of  its  snout.  Garman  called  this  astonishing  eel 
Khinojmiraena  quaesita.  It  was  long  and  slender  and 
brown.  For  some  reason  or  other  I  remembered  exactly 
how  it  looked.  No  second  specimen  has  ever  been  found, 
so  far  as  I  know. 

While  frogging  about  on  an  Amboina  reef  at  low  tide, 
I  saw  a  sky-blue  eel,  long  and  slender  and  quite  active 
when  we  rolled  over  a  slab  of  coral  rock.  By  great  good 
luck  I  caught  it,  and  in  a  second  I  said  to  myself,  "That's 
another  Rhinomuraena  and  a  new  one"  —  and  it  was.  I 
described  it  and  called  it  R.  amboinensis  and  have  it  well 
preserved  to  this  day.  No  other  specimen  has  ever  been 
reported.  Is  it  not  an  extraordinary  coincidence  that  the 
only  two  examples  of  this  unique  eel  should  both  have 
found  their  way  to  Cambridge  —  one  shipped  in  by  the  old 
missionary  ship  The  Momijig  Star  in  1887,  the  other  found 
by  me  exactly  twenty  years  later  more  than  a  thousand 
miles  from  Ebon? 

Our  visit  to  Humboldt  Bay  was  the  climax  of  the  trip 
and  our  leisurely  return  a  pleasant  aftermath.  All  along 
the  line  we  picked  up  objects  which  had  been  collected 
and  saved  for  our  return.  We  stopped  at  just  as  many 
places  on  the  way  back  as  we  did  going  out.  Several  un- 
expected delays  caused  by  waiting  for  dammar  gum  to  be 
brought  down  from  the  interior  gave  us  a  chance  to  garner 
a  great  store  of  ethnological  objects  for  the  Peabody  Mu- 
seum. It  was  well  that  we  did,  for  in  those  days  Papua 
was  still  unspoiled.  Of  course,  I  have  Uved  in  hope  that 
by  some  chance  I  might  once  see  the  interior. 

It  was  at  Hong  Kong  that  we  met  Mr.  Daniel  Russell 
of  the  Imperial  Chinese  Maritime  Customs.  He  came  from 


Wallace  and  the  Dutch  East  5  3 

near  Belfast  and  knew  a  lot  of  the  members  of  Father's 
family,  but  I  think  our  real  bond  was  the  fact  that  he 
was  translating  Bowditch's  Practical  Navigator  into  Chi- 
nese. He  was  certainly  interested  when  he  found  out  that 
"The  Navigator"  was  Rosamond's  great-grandfather.  He 
was  going  to  take  charge  of  the  customhouse  in  the  great 
city  of  Wuchow,  a  city  which  had  only  recently  been 
declared  open  for  foreign  commerce.  He  asked  us  to 
join  him  on  the  trip  upriver.  Wuchow  is  several  hun- 
dred miles  inland  from  Canton  up  the  west  river,  or  the 
Si-kiang  to  give  it  its  proper  name.  The  experience  in  get- 
ting here  was  a  most  interesting  one  and  the  section  of 
China  through  which  we  passed  was  completely  unspoiled. 

We  journeyed  in  a  small,  shallow-draught  river  steamer, 
locked  in  an  enormous  iron  cage.  This  cage  enclosed  the 
bridge,  a  little  dining  saloon  just  aft  the  bridge,  the  offi- 
cers' cabins  and  a  few  tiny  cubbyholes  for  passengers,  and 
a  small  open  area  of  deck.  The  boat  sailed  under  the  British 
jflag;  she  was  spotlessly  clean,  the  food  was  good.  We  had 
several  tall,  bearded  Sikhs  and  three  or  four  Malays  on 
board,  all  heavily  armed,  as  guards.  All  this  because  the 
Chinese  pirates  still  abundant  in  those  days  used  to  come 
aboard  a  few  at  a  time  disguised  as  passengers,  and  then, 
when  enough  of  them  had  assembled,  they  would  produce 
their  hidden  arms  and  try  to  take  the  ship.  This  was  no 
idle  rumor,  for  even  the  big  passenger  steamers  from  Hong 
Kong  to  Canton  caged  their  first-class  passengers.  It  was 
widely  reported  that  pigtails  were  interwoven  with  fish- 
hooks to  discourage  anyone  from  trying  to  make  a  cap- 
ture by  seizing  a  pirate's  cue. 

The  country  through  which  we  passed  was  framed  in 
ridges  of  high  hUls,  with  ancient  temples  and  lovely  pa- 


54  Naturalist  at  Large 

godas  against  the  sky  line.  I  don't  think  we  saw  a  tree 
during  the  entire  journey.  This  long-overpopulated  land 
has  been  deforested  for  ages  and  we  often  saw  women  out 
on  the  river  in  sampans  gleaning  sticks  and  even  straws 
from  the  flotsam  and  jetsam  of  the  river  for  fuel. 

The  little  stern-wheeler  on  which  we  traveled  made 
many  stops.  I  remember  one  place  of  some  importance, 
Sam  Shui,  which  apparently  was  greatly  famed  for  its  culi- 
nary art.  Long  before  we  arrived  there  our  Chinese  pas- 
sengers were  lined  up  along  the  rail  licking  their  chops, 
and  no  sooner  had  we  tied  up  to  the  bank  than  swarms  of 
sampans  came  out,  each  with  one  man  to  row  and  another 
to  dispense  the  chow.  Each  carried  a  hook  on  a  long  rope 
which  they  threw  up  for  one  of  the  passengers  to  hang 
over  the  hand  rail.  The  chef  stood  aft  surrounded  with 
innumerable  little  dishes  sizzling  over  a  charcoal  brazier 
like  a  battery  of  tiny  stoves,  and  with  a  big  tub  of  rice, 
which  was  the  foundation  for  each  meal  served.  In  re- 
sponse to  yells  from  the  passengers,  he  would  grab  a  large, 
grayish,  and  rather  thick  pottery  bowl,  throw  into  the 
bottom  of  it  a  handful  of  rice,  and  then  toss  in  on  top  little 
dabs  and  gobbets  of  bean  curds,  bean  sprouts,  diced  ome- 
lette, diced  eggplant,  fried  duck,  fried  pork  from  chit- 
lins  to  diced  ears  and  bits  of  crisp  fried  pigskin,  white 
grubs,  and  what  looked  like  fried  angleworms  blanched, 
evidently  having  been  kept  in  water  until  they  were  clear 
of  grit.  Not  infrequently  a  little  frog  would  be  added,  too 
small  even,  to  my  notion,  to  be  worth  sucking,  but  it  must 
be  remembered  that  all  food  in  China  has  to  be  prepared 
for  use  with  chopsticks.  As  we  were  leaning  over  the  rail 
one  of  the  Malay  guards  said  to  me,  ''Sabaya  tida  mau 


Photo  by   T.  Barbour 


Photos   hv    R.    P.   Barbour 


UPPER  RIGHT:  R.  P.  B.  at  Alonokwari 
OTHER  three:  Natives  of  Humboldt  Bay 


Wallace  and  the  Dutch  East  5  5 

mackan  kodok  ya?ig  kechil  sekali,''^  which  indicated  not 
that  he  was  disincUned  to  eat  frogs  but  rather  that  he 
scorned  such  Httle  ones. 

The  days  passed  Hke  winking,  the  river  traffic  was  so 
extraordinarily  interesting  to  watch.  There  were  a  few 
steam  launches  towing  barges  of  all  sorts,  but  more  often 
the  boats  were  propelled  by  paddle  wheels  operated  by 
men  working  treadmills,  and  how  tired  the  poor  devils 
looked  is  vivid  in  my  mind's  eye  to  this  day.  The  floating 
duck  ranches  and  even  the  occasional  great  easy-going 
junks  being  towed  upstream  made  this  journey  a  vivid  pic- 
ture of  Chinese  life  as  it  had  been  since  time  immemorial. 
Our  little  white  stern-wheeler  Shui  Hing  was  the  only 
foreign  note. 

Finally  we  reached  Wuchow.  Walking  about  the  city 
was  not  pleasant.  Strangers  were  too  conspicuous  and  the 
people  did  not  mind  showing  their  distaste  of  our  presence. 
However  we  saw  some  heart-rending  but  quite  character- 
istic sights.  I  remember  a  woman  sitting  beside  a  large 
pottery  jar  which  had  to  be  set  into  a  niche  in  the  hillside, 
no  doubt  the  spot  which  the  Fengshui  man  had  told  her 
was  auspicious  as  a  burial  place,  for  the  jar  contained  her 
husband's  bones  sent  back  from  some  far  land,  and  if  her 
grief  was  not  genuine  I  never  saw  any  that  was.  China  is 
a  land  of  poverty  and  sorrow  yet  the  sturdy  good  qualities 
of  her  people  have  kept  her  a  great  nation  for  a  greater 
length  of  time  than  any  other  nation  on  earth  has  been 
able  to  survive. 

Poor  criminals  standing  in  tall  tripods  with  the  tips  of 
their  toes  resting  on  bricks  —  the  penalty  being  that  if  they 
kicked  one  over  they  would  strangle  —  were  a  frequent 


56  Naturalist  at  Large 

sight  and  no  one  even  paused  to  throw  a  glance  their  way. 
We  were  told  that  the  previous  Tao  Tat,  not  the  present 
incumbent  who  came  to  meet  Mr.  Russell,  for  he  seemed 
to  be  a  kindly  old  gentleman,  had  often  snipped  off  crim- 
inals' eyelids  and  then  blew  quicklime  into  their  eyes  before 
they  were  put  into  the  tripod.  The  collar  was  made  large 
enough  so  that  their  hands  could  not  get  to  their  faces. 
Of  course  everywhere  in  China  at  the  time  of  which 
I  write,  criminals  were  seen  walking  about  wearing  the 
cangue,  a  great  broad  wooden  collar,  sometimes  very 
heavy,  on  which  their  sins  were  detailed  in  large  painted 
characters. 

Mr.  Russell  spoke  mandarin  Chinese  fluently  but  the 
Tao  Tai  came  from  the  Province  of  Fokien  and,  as  our 
friend  said,  had  "a  thick  Fuchow  manner  of  speech,"  so 
that  they  did  not  chin  glibly  one  with  the  other;  however, 
Mr.  Russell  gleaned  the  impression  that  the  old  gentleman 
had  some  pirates  in  a  cage  uptown  and  he  would  gladly 
have  them  trundled  down  to  the  beach  and  have  their  heads 
chopped  off  for  our  delectation.  Rosamond  thought  we 
could  pass  this  up  and  I  agreed. 

We  lived  on  board  the  boat,  which  was  tied  up  to  the 
riverbank.  I  have  no  doubt  we  could  have  found  a  Chinese 
inn  but  the  city  was  an  extraordinarily  stinking  and  filthy 
one,  although  far  from  ugly  when  seen  from  a  distance. 
It  had  obviously  been  a  place  of  great  importance  and  I 
think  at  one  time  was  the  capital  of  the  Province  of 
Kwangsi.  At  this  time,  however,  Nanning  was  the  capital. 
Unfortunately  the  river  was  too  low  for  us  to  get  up  there 
so,  bidding  good-bye  to  our  friend,  with  whom  for  years 
I  carried  on  a  desultory  correspondence,  we  slipped  back 


Wallace  and  the  Dutch  East  SI 

down  river  to  Canton.  Thus  ended  a  journey  memorable 
to  be  sure,  but  as  different  in  every  fundamental  detail 
from  our  voyage  to  the  head  of  the  Irrawaddy  as  any 
journey  could  possibly  be. 


CHAPTER  VI 

Flying  Fish  and  Turtles 


F, 


ROM  NOW  ON  the  reader  will  hear  again  and  again 
of  Allison  Armour,  a  friend  of  many  years'  standing. 
Shortly  after  the  First  World  War,  he  converted  a  small 
Swedish  tramp  steamer  into  the  most  luxurious  floating 
laboratory  in  the  world,  and  renamed  her  the  Utoiuana. 
He  did  this  primarily  to  aid  his  friend  David  Fairchild  in 
transporting  useful  plants  for  introduction  into  the  United 
States.  Happily  on  several  occasions  he  asked  me  and  my 
family  to  go  along  and  to  add  zoological  collecting  to  the 
botanical  work. 

On  one  of  these  voyages  I  had  a  unique  opportunity  of 
observing  flying  fish.  The  Utoivana  was  anchored  off 
Mathewstown  on  Watlings  Island,  or  San  Salvador.  Allison 
and  I  entered  one  of  the  ship's  launches  to  go  to  a  cay  off 
the  north  end  of  the  island  where  iguana  lizards  were  said 
to  be  found.  Where  the  yacht  lay  at  anchor  it  was  per- 
fectly calm,  but  when  we  got  clear  of  the  point  an  enor- 
mous oily  swell  was  rolling.  We  were  running  along  with 
the  swell  abeam.  Now  we  would  be  running  aloncr  the 
crest  of  one  of  the  great  rollers  and  the  next  moment  be 
in  the  trough.  On  these  occasions  we  could  look  right  into 
the  great  clear  swells  as  they  loomed  up  on  each  side  of 
the  launch. 

All  of  a  sudden  the  water  broke  and  a  couple  of  flying 
fish,  frightened  by  some  larger  fish  which  I  never  saw, 


4 


Photo   by  Allison   Armour 

Utoii\mc!  in  Port  Castries  Harbor,  St.  Lucia 


Three  deep-sea  fish  drawn  by  Alexander  Agassiz 


Flying  Fish  a?jd  Turtles  59 

flew  directly  across  the  launch,  right  before  my  eyes.  Had 
I  known  the  fish  were  coming,  I  could  have  caught  them 
with  a  net  or  touched  them  with  my  outstretched  hand.  I 
had  thus  an  unrivaled  opportunity  to  kill  once  and  for  all 
the  notion  that  they  move  their  fins  in  flying.  As  is  well 
known,  this  has  been  a  moot  point  amongst  naturalists, 
though  it  never  should  have  been.  No  flight  muscles  are 
revealed  on  dissection  of  the  fish,  yet  the  fact  that  their 
fins  do  move  has  been  insisted  on  time  and  time  again.  I 
have  watched  them  on  so  many  hundreds  of  occasions  that 
I  believe  the  observational  error  is  to  be  explained  in  this 
wise:  The  wings  are  very  thin  and  delicate  and  sometimes 
when  flying  fish  are  chased  out  of  water  and  there  is  a 
good  sharp  breeze  blowing,  their  wings  appear  to  move, 
being  caused  to  flutter  by  the  angle  at  which  the  fish  takes 
the  wind.  Flying  fish  fly  most  freely  in  fairly  calm  weather. 
I  imagine  that  then  they  are  swimming  nearer  to  the  sur- 
face. In  a  heavy  storm  I  have  never  seen  fish  fly  at  all.  Once 
I  saw  one  caught  in  the  air  by  a  canary-yellow  dolphin  fish, 
which  rose  at  least  three  feet  out  of  water  to  snap  up  its 
prey. 

It  was  in  the  Bahamas  on  another  occasion  that  I  saw  an 
interesting  sight.  A  giant  loggerhead  turtle,  floating  lazily 
on  the  surface,  would  swim  up  to  and  gulp  down  Portu- 
guese men-of-war,  or  Physalias,  which  were  floating  about 
abundantly.  The  old  turtle  would  ease  up  to  the  Physaha, 
close  his  eyes,  and  make  a  snap  for  it.  I  suspect  that  the 
hard,  horny  jaws  and  the  tough  skin  were  impervious  to 
the  painful  stinging  caused  by  the  nettle  cells  of  the  Si- 
phonophore's  tentacles,  but  that  probably  the  tender  skin 


60  Naturalist  at  Large 

about  its  eyes  offered  no  such  protection  and  the  blind 
gulps  were  to  protect  these  areas. 

The  loggerhead,  not  being  fit  to  eat,  is  still  an  abundant 
sea  turtle  all  through  the  West  Indian  area.  Green  turtles 
have  grown  scarce  because  they  have  been  hunted  so 
constantly.  They  are  brought  to  Limon  in  Costa  Rica  for 
shipment  to  the  aldermen's  feasts  in  London,  being  carried 
in  individual  tanks  on  the  forward  deck  of  the  Fruit  liners 
crossing  the  ocean.  Kindhearted  persons  often  are  hurt  by 
seeing  the  turtles  kept  lying  on  their  backs.  They  little 
realize  that  if  they  were  kept  lying  plastron  down,  which 
would  be  their  natural  position,  they  would  soon  die,  the 
lower  shell  being  weakly  constructed  and  incapable  of 
long  supporting  the  weight  of  the  turtles.  I  am  sure  this 
would  not  apply  to  small  individuals,  but  I  have  been  in- 
formed by  many  turtlers  that  it  is  dangerous  to  leave  big, 
heavy  turtles  on  their  stomachs  for  very  long. 

Once,  climbing  up  a  high  cliff  overlooking  clear,  still 
water  along  the  shore  of  New  Providence  Island,  I  fright- 
ened two  turtles  which  had  been  grazing  on  seaweeds  on 
the  bottom  quite  close  to  shore.  One  was  a  green  turtle 
and  one  a  so-called  Ridley,  another  species  altogether.  Both 
turtles  raced  away,  the  green  turtle  quite  deliberately  and 
the  Ridley  with  an  astounding  burst  of  speed.  My  friend 
Dr.  Archie  F.  Carr,  Jr.,  of  the  University  of  Florida,  who 
is  an  authority  on  turtles,  has  noticed  this  same  fact  on  a 
number  of  occasions,  and  he  tells  me  that,  unlike  all  other 
sea  turtles,  the  Ridley  when  brought  ashore  snaps  about 
in  such  a  blind  rage  that  it  tires  itself  out  and  would 
probably  fidget  and  worry  itself  to  death  in  a  short  time 
if  allowed  to  do  so.  Sea  turtles  are  fascinating  critters 


Flying  Fish  and  Turtles  61 

and  It  is  a  pity  that  the  demand  for  tortoise  shell  has 
brought  one  magnificent  animal  as  close  to  extinction  as 
the  delicacy  of  its  flesh  has  brought  another. 

Georgetown,  Grand  Cayman,  which  we  visited  on  sev- 
eral occasions,  is  the  center  of  the  green-turtle  industry. 
The  Cayman  Islanders  are  expert  boatbuilders,  and  their 
fast-sailing  schooners  comb  the  cays  of  British  Honduras 
and  Nicaragua,  turtling  for  soup  meat.  I  have  been  told 
that  most  of  the  turtles  are  caught  with  a  bullen,  an  iron 
hoop  to  which  is  attached  a  deep  net.  The  schooner 
anchors.  The  small  boats  set  out  with  one  man  to  scull  in 
the  stern  and  another  in  the  bow  peering  down  into  the 
clear  water  with  a  bucket  having  a  glass  bottom,  called 
a  water  glass.  When  a  green  turtle  is  spied  resting  on  the 
bottom  the  bullen  is  let  down  as  close  to  it  as  possible,  a 
rope  being  attached  to  the  apex  of  the  net.  The  instant  the 
iron  ring  strikes  bottom  the  turtle  gives  a  surprised  leap 
upward,  pushes  its  four  fins  out  through  the  coarse  mesh 
of  the  net  and,  thus  entangled,  may  be  drawn  to  the  sur- 
face. Turtles,  of  course,  are  also  "pegged"  with  a  harpoon 
having  a  little  head  which  comes  loose,  with  a  line  at- 
tached. But  this  is  less  satisfactory  in  that  turtles  may  be 
badly  injured,  hence  less  likely  to  survive  the  long  voyage 
to  market. 

They  seem  pitiful  objects,  with  their  great  fins  folded 
across  their  breasts  made  fast  with  a  bit  of  binder  twine 
rove  through  holes  cut  in  their  flippers.  But  I  suspect  that 
this  really  doesn't  hurt  the  turtle  very  much,  as  they  seem 
to  pay  little  attention  to  much  more  shocking  injuries. 
Individuals  are  often  seen  that  have  lost  a  large  part  of  one 
or  more  flippers,  so  that  in  some  cases  they  can  swim  only 


62  Naturalist  at  Large 

with  difficulty.  This  is  commonly  supposed  to  be  the  work 
of  sharks.  But  I  think  it  is  much  more  likely  that  the  in- 
juries are  caused  by  fighting  with  other  turtles.  There  is 
always  great  excitement  when  the  turtle  schooners  come 
to  Key  West.  One  Cayman  vessel  will  often  carry  a  hun- 
dred or  more  turtles  stacked  up  in  its  hold.  They  probably 
average  200  pounds  apiece  and  the  cargo  is  a  very  valuable 
one. 

I  landed  one  morning  from  the  Utoivana  on  the  Island 
of  Saona,  off  the  coast  of  Haiti.  It  is  a  rather  flat,  unin- 
teresting little  island  and  I  was  not  prepared  for  what  I 
found.  I  knew  that  there  was  a  high  degree  of  endemicity 
on  all  these  islands  around  the  Haitian  coast.  I  knew,  also, 
that  Saona  had  never  been  visited  by  anyone  in  search  of 
reptiles,  so  I  walked  around  the  confines  of  a  small  open 
garden  patch,  knowing  that  this  was  the  sort  of  terrain 
where  one  might  expect  to  find  Ameiva  lizards.  Lizards 
of  this  genus  have  a  way  of  splitting  up,  so  novelties  may 
be  expected. 

I  hunted  a  long  time  before  I  heard  a  noise  in  the  dead 
leaves.  Ameiva  lizards  are  anteaters  and  scratch  with  their 
paws  among  the  leaves,  throwing  them  about  in  their  search 
for  the  insects  which  may  be  below  them.  I  approached 
the  sound  as  stealthily  as  possible  and  could  scarcely  beUeve 
my  eyes  when  I  saw  a  perfectly  typical  Ameiva,  and  by 
the  same  token  one  utterly  unlike  any  which  I  had  ever 
seen.  I  have  collected  countless  numbers  of  lizards  of  this 
genus.  I  shot  this  lizard  on  April  8,  1934.  It  was  lilac  gray 
on  the  back,  washed  with  fawn  color  on  the  head  and 
turning  to  pale  blue  on  the  tail.  A  black  band,  beginning 


Flying  Fish  and  Turtles  63 

with  the  eyes,  ran  along  the  side  of  the  body  and  the  tail, 
which  was  azure  blue  beneath,  while  the  undersurfaces  of 
the  body  were  glaucous  blue,  suffused  anteriorly  with 
cream  color.  The  sides  of  the  head  were  buff  yellow.  All 
in  all,  it  was  one  of  the  most  beautiful  and  strikingly  col- 
ored reptiles  which  I  have  ever  seen. 

I  sent  the  specimen  to  Miss  Cochran  of  the  National 
Museum  in  Washington,  who  was  writing  a  herpetology 
of  the  Island  of  Hispaniola,  although  I  fairly  itched  to 
describe  it  myself.  I  realized  it  was  new  the  second  I  saw 
it,  as  I  have  said  before,  and  I  asked  her  if  she  would  name 
it  for  my  wife.  She  not  only  named  this  species  Ameiva 
rosamojidae,  but  without  my  knowing  it  she  named  the 
Ameiva  from  La  Gonave  Island  for  me. 

The  Haitian  peasants  are  so  poor  that  they  will  struggle 
hard  to  catch  lizards,  snakes,  frogs,  and  toads  —  which  they 
do  not  really  like  to  do  — if  they  can  sell  them  for  five 
cents  each,  and  I  mean  five  cents  of  a  Haitian  gourde, 
which  is  only  worth  fifteen  cents  to  start  with.  V/e  often 
had  as  many  as  a  hundred  people  collecting  for  us.  In  this 
way,  on  the  islands  that  were  populated  of  course,  it  waa 
possible  to  secure  in  a  few  days  as  much  material  as  a  single 
person  could  have  gotten  during  a  long  stay,  so  that  while 
we  stopped  at  innumerable  different  localities  during  these 
voyages  on  the  Utoivana  and  never  had  very  much  time 
at  one  place,  all  around  Haiti  and  in  the  Bahamas  we  got 
big  collections.  You  can  do  this  in  Jamaica,  but  not  in  Cuba. 

We  stopped  on  one  occasion  at  Isle  Tortue.  I  went 
ashore  in  the  morning  and  passed  word  around  that  we 
would  be  back  in  the  latter  part  of  the  afternoon  prepared 
to  purchase  what  might  be  forthcoming,  explaining  what 


64  Naturalist  at  Large 

we  wanted.  I  had  a  sack  of  Haitian  five-cent  pieces  on 
board  the  yacht.  We  found  that  we  got  much  better  re- 
sults from  our  collectors  if  we  ourselves  did  not  stay  where 
they  could  watch  us.  It  was  so  much  more  fun  to  stand 
and  stare  at  strangers  than  it  was  to  do  anything  else  that 
the  temptation  was  quite  overwhelming.  But  if  we  went 
ashore  in  the  morning  and  spread  the  news  of  what  we 
were  prepared  to  do,  then  disappeared  on  board  and 
hauled  up  the  gangway,  by  the  middle  of  the  afternoon 
we  could  go  ashore  and  be  overwhelmed  by  a  rabble  of 
men  and  women,  boys  and  girls,  with  snakes  and  lizards 
dangling  at  the  ends  of  dozens  of  little  lassoes  which  they 
fashioned  cunningly  from  shredded  palm  leaves. 

On  one  occasion  a  poor  old  man  came  up  to  us  with  a 
gourd  full  of  fat  white  grubs.  These  he  had  dug  out  of  a 
rotten  palm  trunk.  I  recognized  them  at  once  as  the  larvae 
of  a  big  weevil  which  lives  in  decayed  palm  wood.  Of 
course  he  brought  them  feeling  sure  we  would  buy  so 
succulent  a  dainty,  for  the  Haitians  are  extremely  fond 
of  these  grubs  fried.  Rosamond  was  utterly  disgusted  by 
their  very  appearance  and  I  was  not  allowed  to  take  them 
on  board  and  eat  them,  which  I  should  have  greatly  en- 
joyed doing.  I  have  no  right  to  complain,  however,  for 
the  family  did  not  relish  the  intimacy  with  a  wide  variety 
of  reptiles  which  they  patiently  endured. 


CHAPTER  VII 

The  Sea  and  the  Cave 


s 


*OME  of  the  most  delightful  incidents  of  my  life  have 
happened  at  sea.  I  recall  a  still,  calm  morning  off  the  west 
coast  of  Nicaragua.  There  was  hterally  not  a  breath  of 
air  to  stir  the  surface  of  the  water.  And  far  and  wide,  scat- 
tered to  the  horizon,  were  the  images  of  white  birds.  They 
appeared  miraged  up  so  that  they  looked  about  twice  as 
big  as  gulls  should  be.  The  answer  was  soon  to  see,  for 
each  gull  was  standing  on  the  back  of  a  basking  sea  turtle 
floating  or  swimming  slowly  upon  the  surface  of  the  ocean. 
The  effect  was  extraordinarily  lovely,  and  I  have  always  re- 
called it  with  the  greatest  pleasure. 

A  few  days  later,  with  the  same  good  weather,  we  passed 
through  great  swarms  of  coral-red  crabs  swimming  busily 
along  the  surface  of  the  ocean,  as  if  all  bound  upon  an 
important  errand. 

I  often  think  of  the  emotion  and  excitement,  which  I 
suppose  has  occurred  for  years  and  will  occur  until  time 
ends,  when  a  naturalist  sees  an  albatross  for  the  first  time. 
On  the  wing  —  and  you  mighty  seldom  see  them  swim- 
ming on  the  surface  of  the  sea  —  they  look  entirely  unlike 
any  other  bird.  Their  wings  are  so  long  and  so  sharply 
pointed  that  you  hardly  see  the  body  at  all;  you  simply 
see  this  great,  straight,  unbending  pair  of  wings.  To  see 
them  at  their  best  the  sea  should  be  stormy. 

They  don't  sail  the  billows  as  peHcans  do,  rising  and 


66  Naturalist  at  Large 

gliding  with  their  wings  parallel  with  the  surface  of  the 
water,  but  they  cut  and  pivot  and  jibe  about  as  if  they 
were  standing  on  end  more  than  half  the  time.  Indeed,  it 
looks  as  if  they  stuck  the  tip  of  one  wing  in  the  water  and 
used  this  as  a  fulcrum  as  they  pivot  to  swing  past  the  crest 
of  a  wave.  On  the  voyage  to  South  Africa  you  meet  them 
shortly  after  leaving  Saint  Helena,  and  for  a  day  or  so 
before  reaching  Cape  Town  you  may  see  great  numbers. 
They  are  perhaps  even  more  abundant  off  Southern  Chile, 
and  if  by  chance  you  should  pass  near  the  floating  carcass 
of  a  whale  you  will  see  them  in  swarms,  Hke  herring  gulls 
in  the  harbor  of  Key  West  after  a  bad  cold  spell  in  the 
north. 

Porpoises  are  always  diverting  and,  of  course,  are  fa- 
miliar to  every  traveler  at  sea.  But  on  three  occasions  we 
were  extraordinarily  thrilled  by  seeing  gigantic  schools  of 
porpoises  that  behaved  m  a  quite  extraordinary  manner. 
More  than  one  species  must  have  been  involved,  for  once 
we  saw  what  I  am  about  to  describe  off  the  west  coast  of 
Costa  Rica,  once  near  Amboina  in  the  Moluccas,  and  the 
third  time  nearing  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope. 

On  each  occasion  the  sea  was  calm  and  still.  There  may 
have  been  an  occasional  porpoise  rolling  lazily,  as  one  is 
accustomed  to  observe  them,  but  on  each  of  these  three 
mornings  the  sea  became  suddenly  alive  with  porpoises  — 
thousands  upon  thousands  of  them,  rolling  and  jumping 
high  in  the  air,  jumping  over  one  another,  past  one  an- 
other, boiling  and  plunging.  There  seemed  no  question  but 
that  they  were  playing,  as  I  saw  no  evidence  that  they 
were  driving  fish  before  them.  After  carrying  on  in  this 
manner  for  perhaps  half  or  three  quarters  of  an  hour,  as  if 


The  Sea  and  the  Cave  67 

at  a  signal  the  whole  school  swam  off.  As  they  disappeared, 
the  animals  rolled  gently  in  order  to  breathe,  but  they 
hardly  cut  the  surface  of  the  water. 

Another  morning  I  like  to  tliink  about  was  when  the 
Utoivana  lay  anchored  off  the  mouth  of  the  Yaqui  River 
at  the  head  of  the  Gulf  of  Samana  in  the  Dominican  Re- 
public. The  muddy  water  of  the  river  pushed  out  into  the 
clear  turquoise-blue  water  of  the  Gulf,  with  the  line  of 
division  sharply  marked  since  the  dirty  fresh  water  did 
not  readily  mix  with  the  clean  salt  water  of  the  ocean.  An 
extraordinary  procession  patrolled  the  boundary  line.  Giant 
rays  went  flying  through  the  water,  their  great  wings  flap- 
ping, each  one  as  big  as  the  top  of  a  grand  piano,  and 
some  larger.  They  were  so  near  the  surface  that  their 
great  fins  came  up  into  the  air  as  they  flapped  their  way 
along,  and  every  once  in  a  while  one  would  leap  high  and 
land  with  a  resounding  whack.  This  kept  on  pretty  much 
all  day. 

One  would  naturally  suppose  that  they  were  feeding, 
and  yet  these  great  fish  are  normally  bottom  feeders.  With 
their  protrudable  lips  they  pick  up  clams  or  conchs  on 
the  bottom  and  crush  them  with  their  curiously  modified, 
flat,  platelike  teeth.  In  the  Oceanarium  at  Marineland,  in 
Florida,  they  had  a  ray  which  picked  hard  clams  off  the 
bottom,  and  I  could  hear  them  crack.  The  crunch  which 
ground  them  up  was  so  powerful  that  the  noise  carried 
through  the  plate  glass. 

It  is  a  pity  that  the  Gulf  of  Samana  is  not  readily  acces- 
sible to  visitors.  It  is  one  of  the  loveliest  spots  in  the  whole 
world.  On  the  north  side  the  mountains  rise,  covered  with 
a  fine  green  forest.  Down  the  mountain  roads  the  peasants 


68  Naturalist  at  Large 

come  riding  their  well-trained  bulls  laden  with  heavy  packs 
to  go  to  market  in  little  towns  like  Santa  Barbara  de 
Samana  —  quaint  little  Old  World  towns  that  date  back 
almost  to  the  time  of  Columbus. 

The  other  side  of  the  Gulf  offers  a  complete  contrast, 
for  long  ago  this  must  have  been  a  flat  limestone  plain 
which  has  been  cut  and  eroded  away  to  form  a  labyrinth 
of  little  rocky  islands,  each  one  deeply  undercut  by  the 
surf,  the  rocks  dripping  with  orchids  and  begonias  and 
great  elephant-eared  aroids,  and  beset  with  tall  slender 
palms.  Their  little  stalks  are  strong  as  a  long  iron  bar 
would  be,  for  these  palms  are  old  and  have  stood  against 
countless  hurricanes.  There  are  many  caves  in  these  little 
islands,  in  some  of  which  fishermen  live  in  primitive  sim- 
plicity —  a  fairyland,  if  ever  there  was  one. 

In  1908  I  went  as  a  delegate  to  the  first  Pan  American 
Scientific  Congress,  held  at  Santiago,  in  Chile.  Because  it 
was  more  convenient  in  those  days,  we  went  to  Europe 
and  sailed  from  Lisbon  to  Brazil.  Then  we  visited  Monte- 
video and  Buenos  Aires.  A  theft  of  jewelry  from  my  wife, 
which  required  us  to  return  to  Mendoza  to  testify,  pre- 
vented us  from  crossing  the  Andes  with  the  American 
delegation  to  the  Congress.  I  had  not  expected  that  this 
South  American  journey  would  afford  many  zoological 
high  lights,  for  it  had  a  political  background,  but  this  delay 
provided  a  few  which  I  should  like  to  record. 

Everyone  deplored  the  fact  that  we  could  not  travel 
straight  through  from  Buenos  Aires  to  Santiago.  The  rail- 
road, however,  was  not  yet  completed.  We  went  by  night 
from  Buenos  Aires  to  Mendoza  on  the  very  comfortable 


Photo  by  Fyank   White  of  the  American  Urchid  Society 


Dancinsf  Girl  Orchids  recall  the  market  at  San  Salvador 


The  Sea  and  the  Cave  69 

broad-gauge  sleeper,  spent  a  day  there,  and  the  following 
morning  took  the  narrow-gauge  Trans-Andean  line.  But 
everything  turned  out  well.  The  officials  of  the  railroad 
allowed  us  to  ride  on  the  cowcatcher,  getting  on  where  the 
real  rise  begins,  at  Punta  de  Las  Vacas  — where  I  found 
two  good  toads  in  a  small  water  tank  which  supplied  the 
locomotive  —  and  from  there  riding  to  the  end  of  the 
line  on  the  Argentine  side.  The  railroad  wove  about,  ris- 
ing ever  higher  and  higher.  To  right  and  to  left  we  had 
a  splendid  panorama  of  high  mountains.  The  terminus  was 
at  Puente  del  Inca,  where  a  simple  but  clean  and  com- 
fortable little  bath  house  had  been  built  in  connection 
with  some  hot  springs  that  gushed  out  near  the  natural 
bridge  which  gives  the  place  its  name.  We  stayed  there 
several  days.  Finding  excellent  sure-footed  mules  avail- 
able, we  took  the  opportunity  to  see  some  of  the  most 
superb  mountain  scenery  in  the  world  and  to  catch 
glimpses  of  the  bird  life  of  the  highest  elevations  of  this 
southeastern  portion  of  the  Andes. 

Fitzgerald  began  his  classic  ascent  of  Mount  Aconcagua 
from  the  Horcones  Valley  whence  the  ascent  is  steep 
and  long  but  fairly  direct.  In  this  valley  high  up  on  the 
hip  of  the  highest  mountain  in  either  North  or  South 
America  there  lies  a  charming  little  lake.  It  is  called  the 
Laguna  del  Inca,  although  in  all  probability  no  Inca  ever 
laid  eyes  on  it.  The  view  of  this  little  azure  gem  of  a  pond 
sparkling  in  the  brilliant  sunlight,  with  the  majestic  snow- 
clad  slopes  of  the  great  mountain  overshadowing  it,  was 
one  of  the  most  ineifably  lovely  views  I  have  ever  seen. 

I  don't  know  exactly  what  the  altitude  of  the  pond  is, 
but  I  suspect  it  to  be  about  14,000  feet.  I  rode  up  to  its 


70  Naturalist  at  Large 

shores  with  the  keenest  anticipation.  On  this  day  I  took 
the  precaution  of  rolling  a  stone  over  on  the  reins  of  my 
mule  —  because  the  day  before,  high  up  on  a  mountain  to 
the  south  of  Puente  del  Inca,  my  mule  had  walked  away 
from  me  down  a  rocky  slope  so  precipitous  that  I  expected 
him  to  go  head  over  heels  at  any  moment.  Luckily  our  guide 
appeared  on  the  scene  and  spurred  his  own  magnificent  an- 
imal after  my  beast  lickity  gallop  down  this  same  slope. 
He  caught  my  mule  and  brought  it  back  to  me  with  a 
smile  as  if  he  had  done  nothing,  but  I  had  learned  my  lesson. 

On  this  occasion  I  was  praying  under  my  breath  that  I 
might  see  a  tiny  brown  lizard  about  five  inches  long  and 
quite  nondescript  as  to  form  and  color.  I  had  happened  to 
read  Fitzgerald's  account  of  climbing  Mount  Aconcagua 
not  long  before  we  started  for  South  America  and  I  re- 
membered that  in  the  appendix  of  the  book  Dr.  G.  A.  Bou- 
lenger  of  the  British  Museum  had  described  a  lizard,  which 
he  called  LiolaeTmis  fitzgeraldi,  and  that  it  came  from  within 
a  few  hundred  yards  of  where  I  stood.  In  the  winking  of 
an  eye  I  spotted  one  resting  on  a  stone  in  the  sun,  but 
catching  him  was  quite  another  matter.  I  am  big  and  clumsy 
—  and  clumsier  still  when  I  am  at  14,000  feet  above  sea  level. 
My  puffs  and  grunts  as  I  lunged  in  vain  amused  Rosamond 
and  Archie  Coolidge  hugely.  In  time  patience  had  its  re- 
ward and  I  ended  up  with  seven  or  eight  of  the  little  devils, 
which  I  suspect  no  one  but  Fitzgerald  and  I  had  ever 
caught.  This  locality  may  not  be  the  highest  spot  in  the 
world  where  lizards  live  but  it  certainly  is  one  of  them. 

While  this  chase  was  going  on,  the  great  condors  kept 
sweeping  by  in  majestic  flight.  No  one  of  the  carrion-eating 
birds  is  so  clean-looking  and  attractive,  except  possibly  the 


The  Sea  and  the  Cave  71 

King  vulture  of  tropical  America.  There  is  nothing  of  the 
linpleasant  appearance  when  you  see  them  near  by  that 
marks  our  turkey  buzzards  or  more  particularly  the  vul- 
tures of  the  Old  World,  many  of  which  are  inexpressibly 
loathsome.  But  it  was  not  the  condors  which  gave  us  the 
greatest  thrill  but  rather  the  giant  hummers.  Scientists  know 
this  bird  as  Fatagona  gigas;  it  is  the  largest  member  of  that 
most  numerous  family  of  birds,  the  Trochilidae.  Patagona 
does  not  share  the  beauty  of  form  and  color  of  most  of 
the  members  of  this  group.  It  is  purely  remarkable  for  its 
size  —  considering  that  it  is  a  hummingbird  —  for  it  is  nearly 
as  big  as  a  robin.  Of  a  dull,  rusty  gray-brown  color,  it  sits 
stupidly  perched  on  sticks  and  stones,  is  quite  tame,  and  is 
awkward  in  shape.  It  is  cylindrical  in  appearance  as  its  rests 
with  its  long  wings  folded.  It  may  not  sound  like  a  very 
exciting  bird  to  behold,  but  it  gave  me  an  everlasting  thrill. 

While  our  colleagues  on  the  trip  had  been  transported 
from  railhead  to  railhead  in  horse-drawn  coaches,  we  trav- 
eled on  horseback,  reaching  the  Chilean  side  on  a  day 
when  there  was  no  train.  By  great  good  fortune  we  found 
that  some  of  the  railway  engineers  were  going  down  to 
Santa  Rosa  in  a  gravity  car  and  they  took  us  "down  the 
hill"  with  them. 

We  all  sat  bunched  up  on  an  open  platform  with  noth- 
ing to  hang  onto  —  and  how  we  jerked  as  we  took  the 
curves!  From  Juncal  down  to  Santa  Rosa  is  a  vertical  drop 
of  about  10,000  feet:  we  took  it  at  a  rush  through  tunnels 
and  over  trestles  with  nothing  but  a  hand  brake  between 
us  and  the  blue.  There  was  a  burro  on  the  tracks  near  the 
end  of  a  long  tunnel,  but  we  shouted  him  out  of  the  way 
just  in  time.  The  engineers  had  broken  all  rules  in  taking 


72  Naturalist  at  Large 

us  with  them,  and  when  at  last  we  were  safely  down  at  sea 
level,  Rosamond  and  I  repaid  them  in  champagne. 

The  festivities  in  connection  with  the  Congress  at  San- 
tiago were  cordial  and  extremely  well  organized,  but  of 
more  interest  to  us  was  the  visit  to  Valdivia  and  Corral, 
in  the  south  of  Chile.  Here  we  succeeded  in  finding  not 
only  some  new  fresh-water  Crustacea  but  some  extremely 
interesting  frogs  and  toads. 

One  day  when  we  had  run  out  of  containers  I  purloined 
Rosamond's  sponge  bag  and  filled  it  with  frogs,  hung  it  up 
in  our  room,  and  went  out  to  buy  bottles.  I  hadn't  tied  it 
up  very  well  and  when  I  got  back  the  floor,  furniture, 
and  walls  were  liberally  besprinkled  with  tree  frogs  hop- 
ping about  and  climbing  with  their  little  sucking  toes  over 
everything,  including  the  windowpanes.  As  usual  I  was 
penitent  and  unpopular,  but  this  didn't  catch  the  frogs. 

Don  Carlos  Reed  helped  me  secure  our  grand  series  of 
Rhinoderma.  This  strange  little  frog  has  a  unique  habit,  in- 
asmuch as  the  male  picks  up  the  eggs  as  the  female  lays 
them  and  packs  them  into  the  singing  pouch  in  his  throat. 
Here  in  due  time  they  develop  to  the  point  where,  when 
he  opens  his  mouth,  the  little  froglets  leap  forth  into  free- 
dom. The  tadpole  stage  is  passed  in  the  male  parent's  throat 
pouch.  This  frog  is  confined  to  southern  Chile.  Around 
Valdivia  and  Corral,  we  had  some  very  fruitful  collecting, 
finding  not  only  lizards  and  amphibians  but  some  extremely 
interesting  fresh-water  Crustacea  as  well,  including  a  new 
fresh-water  crayfish  recorded  from  the  most  southerly  sta- 
tion in  America. 

On  our  voyage  north  when  we  landed  at  Coquimbo  we 
were  invited  to  drink  a  glass  of  champagne  with  tlie  city 


The  Sea  and  the  Cave  73 

fathers  of  the  old  town  of  La  Serena  some  miles  inland. 
And  while  this  is  one  of  the  driest  and  most  deserty  parts 
of  the  world,  I  spotted  a  little  marsh  not  far  from  the  in- 
land town.  As  soon  as  I  sipped  down  the  warm  sweet 
champagne  and  could  make  a  polite  getaway,  I  skipped 
out  and  found  that  the  marsh  was  swarming  with  frogs. 
This  was  all  to  the  good,  and  I  caught  a  number  of  them. 

A  few  days  later  at  Pisagua  a  penguin  which  I  had  seen 
from  a  distance  came  swimming  right  up  to  our  ship  just 
after  we  dropped  anchor.  Here  the  water  was  crystal  clear 
and  the  bird,  nipping  its  head  from  side  to  side  as  it  peered 
about,  came  right  up  to  the  side  of  the  ship.  Then  it  dove 
with  a  sudden  plunge  and  passed  straight  under  the  keel, 
giving  me  time  to  run  across  the  deck  to  see  it  come  up  on 
the  other  side  of  the  vessel.  Since  boyhood  I  had  longed  to 
see  a  penguin  at  large.  To  me  the  sight  was  as  memorable 
as  that  glimpse  of  the  giant  dolphin  which,  to  rid  himself 
of  a  sucking  fish,  rubbed  it  off  against  the  side  of  our  ves- 
sel in  the  harbor  of  Port  Said  and  then,  making  a  quick  turn 
over  backwards,  snapped  up  the  fish  and  ate  it. 

The  great  herds  of  sea  lions  along  this  part  of  the  South 
American  coast  were  also  sources  of  amusement  and  inter- 
est. In  those  days  ships  anchored  far  off  shore  and  one 
reached  the  town  in  longboats  which  were  laboriously 
rowed  shoreward.  The  sea  lions  leaping  in  the  air  and 
calHng  out  with  their  characteristic  raucous  cries  were 
jolly  companions  on  every  trip  to  land. 

I  recall  one  rather  gruesome  event,  when  all  the  lizards 
around  Areca  seemed  to  be  concentrated  near  a  graveyard 
which  had  been,  shall  I  say,  seriously  disturbed  by  a  recent 
earthquake.  It  was  hard  even  for  a  rabid  enthusiast  to  fol- 


74  Naturalist  at  Large 

low  a  lizard  which  had  run  into  the  boot  on  the  foot  of  a 
corpse,  even  though  the  corpse  was  pretty  well  dried  up 
and  shriveled.  This  drying  happens  quickly  in  this  ex- 
cessively dry  climate. 

Some  friends  of  ours,  the  Arthur  Jacksons,  had  lived 
for  many  years  in  La  Paz  in  Bolivia.  Arthur  had  charge  of 
the  interests  of  the  Boston  and  Bolivia  Rubber  Company. 
Through  him  I  met  a  Mr.  Dunleavy  who  mined  placer  gold 
at  the  junction  of  the  Kaka  and  Beni  rivers,  far  down  in 
the  Amazonian  forest.  He  gave  me  a  lizard  which  he  had 
picked  up  near  his  gold  diggings  and  one  which  was  not 
only  new  but  which  was  one  of  the  most  beautiful  that  I 
have  ever  seen.  It  was  ringed  with  sharply  defined  bands  of 
black  and  ivory  white  and  the  whole  under  surface  of  the 
beast  was  suffused  with  a  rich  rosy  hue.  I  named  it  Diplo- 
glossus  resplendens  and  it  has  never  been  found  again  from 
that  day  to  this.  By  a  curious  coincidence  my  cousin  Gor- 
don Barbour  now  owns  and  operates  this  same  gold  field, 
flying  in  and  out  from  La  Paz  with  his  own  airplane  instead 
of  riding  over  the  bitterly  cold  Andean  passes  via  Sorata 
for  days  and  days  on  muleback,  formerly  the  only  way  to 
enter  the  region. 

The  Jacksons  knew  the  railroad  people  well,  and  were 
aware  of  their  hospitality  to  strangers.  They  arranged  for 
a  day  at  the  ruins  of  Tiaguanaco.  We  had  a  car  hitched 
to  the  early  morning  train  from  La  Paz  to  Guaqui  on  Lake 
Titicaca.  This  was  dropped  off  at  a  siding  near  the  ruins, 
which  are  directly  beside  the  railroad  track.  We  lunched 
in  the  car  and  returned  from  time  to  time  to  deposit  our 
plunder  until  the  evening  train  picked  us  up  and  brought 
us  back  to  La  Paz.  I  had  an  unforgettable  experience  here 


The  Sea  and  the  Cave  75 

chasing  lizards  in  a  snow  flurry  albeit  at  a  mighty  slow  pace, 
for  the  ruins  stand  some  13,000  feet  above  sea  level.  We 
found,  however,  that  these  lizards  tended  to  run  in  under 
one  of  the  loose  stones  of  masonry  which  had  fallen  from 
the  ruins,  scattered  everywhere  over  the  high  plain.  By 
turning  over  the  smaller  stones  it  was  possible  to  catch 
the  lizard  with  a  quick  slap  of  the  hand.  I  caught  an  inter- 
esting new  species  of  the  same  genus  Liolaemus  which  I 
had  first  taken  at  the  Honcones  Valley  and  of  which  by 
this  time,  during  our  various  collectings  over  western  South 
America,  I  must  have  picked  up  a  dozen  different  species. 

Traveling  on  the  west  coast  of  South  America  was  a 
leisurely  process  forty  years  ago  compared  to  what  it  is 
today.  We  made  three  bites  of  the  cherry,  going  first  from 
Valparaiso  to  Mollendo  in  an  old-fashioned  Chilean  vessel, 
the  Lbnari.  Then  later  we  moved  up  the  coast  from  Mol- 
lendo to  Callao  and  then  from  Callao  to  Panama,  the  three 
laps  consuming  forty  days.  This  of  course  gave  a  wonder- 
ful opportunity  to  see  this  most  entrancing  coast  line,  since 
we  stopped,  I  think,  at  least  once  every  day  and  cruised 
along  slowly  close  to  the  shore.  The  abundant  bird  fife  and 
its  relation  to  the  Humboldt  current  have  been  described 
very  adequately,  but  the  beauty  of  the  scenery  has  never 
been  exaggerated.  I  include  the  birds  as  part  of  the  scenery, 
the  great  long  rippling  fines  of  boobies  which  would  cross 
right  over  the  ship,  and  the  unbefievable  number  of  cormo- 
rants and  pelicans. 

Once  on  this  trip  we  occasioned  considerable  consterna- 
tion. We  put  up  at  the  Hotel  Ratti  in  Jufiaca  —  concerning 
which  I  remember  only  that  the  pillowcases  stuck  to  the 
pillows!  But  we  had  acquired  a  rare  Armadillo  at  Viacha 


76  Naturalist  at  Large 

in  Bolivia,  which  we  had  not  been  able  to  preserve  as  a 
specimen  and  which  was  not  very  efficiently  caged.  It  es- 
caped in  our  room  in  the  hotel,  rushed  pell-mell  out  to  the 
balcony  directly  over  the  front  door,  and  plunged  over- 
board —  landing  in  the  midst  of  one  of  those  conclaves  of 
city  fathers  who  always  appear  to  be  discussing  something 
very  important.  My  unpopularity  for  a  time  was  un- 
bounded. 

It  was  a  bitter  disappointment  that  limitations  of  time, 
steamboat  accommodations  available,  and  other  circum- 
stances prevented  our  going  to  Cuzco.  Perhaps  we  were 
foolish  not  to  have  thrown  up  everything  else  and  made  the 
trip,  but  the  raihroad  had  been  laid  recently  and  had  a  way 
of  sinking  down  along  the  stretches  of  boggy  land.  We 
were  simply  cowardly  about  it  and  missed  a  visit  which  I 
have  regretted  a  thousand  times.  Of  course  Arequipa  was 
charming,  the  mountains  glorious,  the  vegetation  exciting 
to  a  naturalist,  and  the  traveling  crescentic  sand  dunes 
called  Medanos  seen  about  halfway  to  MoUendo  extraordi- 
narily arresting. 

One  little  event  occurred  at  Lima  which  is  perhaps  worth 
recording.  Our  room  was  on  that  side  of  the  old  Hotel 
Maury  directly  across  from  one  of  the  towers  of  the  great 
cathedral.  One  evening  I  said  to  Rosamond,  "Those  are 
awfully  funny-looking  bats  going  in  and  out  of  that  hole 
in  the  tower  across  the  street."  We  stood  there,  leaning  on 
the  railing  of  the  little  balcony  of  our  room,  watching 
them,  when  all  of  a  sudden,  by  the  greatest  good  fortune, 
one  of  the  bats  detached  itself  from  its  companions  and 
flew  directly  into  our  room.  We  slammed  the  doors  and 
got  it.  It  proved  to  be  Amorphochilus  schnabeU,  a  bat  which 


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The  Sea  and  the  Cave  77 

had  been  described  many  many  years  before  by  Peters  from 
a  specimen  caught  up  at  Tumbez  near  the  Ecuadorian  fron- 
tier and  which  had  never  been  found  again  until  we  caught 
our  one  tiny  windfall. 

We  returned  from  the  Congress  with  General  Gorgas 
and  his  family:  they  were  bound  for  Panama  but  we  were 
going  only  as  far  as  southern  Peru.  We  were  together  for 
two  weeks  on  the  old  Chilean  ship,  the  Li?7mri.  We  hadn't 
been  on  board  long  when  Rosamond  found  that  one  of 
the  two  bathroom  doors  was  always  locked.  This  was  ex- 
tremely inconvenient,  and  she  spent  some  time  spying  out 
the  cause.  After  some  conniving  she  got  a  look  into  the 
room  and  found  that  the  bathtub  was  full  of  water  in  which 
were  swimming  a  number  of  goldfish. 

Bishop  Pierola,  the  shepherd  of  the  enormous  Indian 
diocese  of  Huanuco  in  the  Andes  of  Peru,  had  been  to 
make  his  ad  limma  visit  to  the  Sovereign  Pontiff  in  Rome. 
He  had  acquired  the  goldfish,  and  his  chaplain,  being 
charged  with  their  safekeeping,  had  simply  bribed  the  bath 
steward  and  taken  up  one  of  the  two  bathrooms  in  the 
ship  for  the  Bishop's  goldfish.  They  stayed  there,  too. 

Later  on  General  Gorgas,  who  did  not  speak  much  Span- 
ish, came  to  me  and  asked  me  to  tell  the  7f70zo  in  charge  of 
the  one  remaining  bathroom  that  he  wanted  clean  water. 
The  fresh-water  supply  was  locked  up  and  we  couldn't 
run  our  own  baths  as  the  supply  was  limited;  hence  the 
necessity  of  calling  the  ?}70Z0.  (Gorgas  had  not  learned 
Spanish  on  purpose,  because,  as  he  said,  he  had  so  many 
difficult  duties  and  such  unpleasant  ones,  in  connection 
with  the  sanitation  of  Panama,  the  burning  of  buildings 
and  worse,  that  he  did  not  wish  to  be  able  to  understand 


78  Naturalist  at  Large 

the  frightful  curses  which  were  heaped  upon  him.)  I  spoke 
a  little  Spanish  and  approached  the  mozo,  who  answered, 
"Tell  the  General  that  the  bath  water  is  sweet  and  nice. 
Nobody  has  been  in  it  but  those  two  young  North  Amer- 
ican ladies,  and  they  use  such  sweet-smelling  soap."  The 
General,  however,  insisted  that  he  preferred  clean  water, 
and  finally  he  got  it. 

When  we  reached  Panama  the  Gorgas  family  was  so 
kind  to  us  that  we  felt  we  had  reached  home.  The  General 
ordered  a  place  fixed  up  for  me  to  work  in  the  old  Board  of 
Health  Laboratory.  And  one  event  of  our  stay  was  suf- 
ficiently exciting  to  record  here.  I  had  one  of  the  first-class, 
all-wool,  yard-wide  frights  of  my  entire  life.  Through  Dr. 
Gorgas  I  met  Mr.  Le  Prince,  one  of  his  most  famous  mos- 
quito sleuths.  Le  Prince  was  a  keen  sportsman.  One  eve- 
ning he  suggested  that  we  go  deer  hunting  across  the  canal 
out  in  the  country,  which  I  suppose  now  would  be  desig- 
nated as  inland  from  La  Venta  Beach.  He  had  an  extra 
headhght  for  me  and  we  borrowed  an  extra  gun.  Tracks  in 
the  mud  showed  that  there  were  plenty  of  deer,  but  for 
some  reason  we  did  not  succeed  in  shining  a  single  pair  of 
eyes.  We  walked  and  walked.  Finally,  far  ahead  down  an 
old  road,  in  the  scrubby  woods,  I  saw  a  pair  of  blazing  orbs. 
I  knew  mighty  well  they  were  not  the  eyes  of  a  deer  but 
what  they  were  I  could  not  guess.  I  strongly  suspected  a 
jaguar. 

I  stood  looking  at  them,  when  all  of  a  sudden  it  became 
obvious  that  they  were  approaching  me  very  rapidly  in- 
deed, rapidly  and  soundlessly.  In  less  time  than  it  takes  to 
tell  it,  they  rushed  at  my  light  and  swept  by  over  my  shoul- 
der, my  face  being  fanned  with  the  air  moved  by  the  wings 


The  Sea  and  the  Cave  79 

of  a  big  owl  —  Rhinoptynx,  no  doubt.  The  whole  occur- 
rence happened  in  such  a  short  time  that  I  had  never  thought 
of  shooting.  I  can't  say  that  fear  bathed  me  in  sweat,  be- 
cause I  had  been  as  completely  wet  with  sweat  as  any  hu- 
man being  could  be  from  the  moment  our  hunt  began.  But 
my  knees  were  certainly  rattling  and  I  was  as  jittery  as  I 
have  ever  been,  which  is  saying  a  good  deal.  We  walked 
back,  shining  no  more  eyes  excepting  those  of  the  enor- 
mous bird-eating  spiders  which  are  always  aprowl  at  that 
late  hour,  and  whose  eyes  looked  like  fiery  emeralds.  When 
we  reached  the  spot  where  we  had  left  our  borrowed  am- 
bulance, we  dealt  out  a  stiff  swig  of  quinine  and  clop- 
clopped  back  behind  our  army  mules  to  our  quarters  in 
Ancon. 

I  can  hardly  credit  my  memory  when  I  think  of  a  trip 
like  this  or  the  visit  we  made,  also  in  an  army  ambulance, 
to  the  ruins  of  old  Panama.  As  I  remember  it,  Aileen  Gorgas 
and  I  rode  horseback;  all  the  rest  rode  behind  the  mules.  Can 
there  be  any  spot  in  the  entire  world  today  which  offers  a 
more  complete  contrast  than  the  Panama  Canal  Zones  of 
1908  and  1943?  It  is  a  safer  place  to  live  in  today,  as  far  as 
health  conditions  go,  but,  it  was  a  far  more  amusing  and 
delightful  spot  at  the  time  of  which  I  write. 

In  1 9 10,  with  a  number  of  others,  I  represented  the  As- 
sociation of  American  Universities  at  the  reopening  of  the 
ancient  University  of  Mexico  in  Mexico  City.  This  coin- 
cided with  General  Porfirio  Diaz's  last  inauguration  as 
President.  We  were  sumptuously  cared  for  by  the  Mexi- 
can government.  We  American  delegates  had  a  house  at 
our  disposal,  and  motorcars  at  beck  and  call.  The  great 


80  Naturalist  at  Large 

banquet,  given  to  all  the  assembled  dignitaries,  was  one 
of  the  most  extraordinary  occasions  of  its  kind  that  I  have 
ever  attended.  The  tables  were  set  on  the  floor  of  an  enor- 
mous cave  near  the  pyramids  at  San  Juan  Teotihuacan,  and 
not  only  were  the  silver  and  china  —  brought  from  the 
palace  in  Mexico  —  decorative  in  the  extreme,  but  the  en- 
tire floor  of  the  cave  was  carpeted  several  inches  deep  with 
tens  of  thousands  of  gardenia  blossoms.  Of  course  these  can 
be  bought  for  a  song  in  the  highlands  of  Mexico,  but  the 
effect  was  amazing  and  the  scent  almost  overpowering. 

The  inaugural  festivities  in  Mexico  ended  with  a  proces- 
sion in  which  General  Diaz  walked  with  the  delegates,  who 
wore  academic  costumes  and  made  quite  a  show  of  color. 
The  next  day  there  was  a  military  parade,  and  after  seeing 
the  ten  thousand  Rurales  prance  by  on  their  beautiful 
horses  and  with  their  extraordinarily  striking  costumes  one 
little  dreamed  that  in  but  a  short  time  Diaz  would  be  leav- 
ing Mexico  for  Spain  as  a  refugee. 

Before  returning  north  Professor  Tozzer,  Clarence  Hay, 
Rosamond,  and  I  visited  the  ruins  of  Xochicalco  near  the 
boundary  of  the  states  of  Morelos  and  Guerrero.  The 
things  that  stick  out  in  my  memory  above  all  else  are  the 
buildings  which  the  Indians  at  the  village  of  Temisco  in 
Morelos  made  to  store  their  corn;  the  rock  iguanas,  big 
black  lizards  which  decorated  every  stone  wall;  the  dreary 
ride,  and  the  uncomfortable  night  at  the  ruins.  But  topping 
all  else,  I  remember  the  visit  to  a  near-by  cave  in  which, 
by  the  greatest  good  fortune,  I  managed  to  secure  with  my 
hat  some  specimens  of  a  rare  bat,  Choeronycteris. 

I  became  so  interested  in  caves  at  one  time  that  I  sug- 
gested to  William  Morton  Wheeler  that  we  start  a  Society 


The  Sea  and  the  Cave  81 

of  Speleologists.  He  was  enthusiastic,  but  we  finally  con- 
cluded that  there  was  not  enough  of  an  interested  group  to 
make  it  worth  trying. 

I  have  had  grand  experiences  exploring  caves.  In  the 
spring  of  1 9 1 1 ,  Dr.  Carlos  de  la  Torre,  of  the  University 
of  Havana,  found  among  the  notes  which  he  had  inherited 
from  his  old  teacher,  Felipe  Poey  —  a  very  great  naturaHst 
indeed,  and  one  whose  contributions  to  the  natural  his- 
tory of  Cuba  are  well  known  — the  statement  that  there 
was  a  cave  near  Cojimar  which  had  red  shrimps  in  it.  Don 
Carlos  and  I  took  a  guardano  —  one  of  those  little  canopy- 
topped  rowboats  that  ferry  one  about  the  harbor  of  Ha- 
vana —  and  crossed  over  to  Morro  Castle. 

On  the  little  beach  just  by  the  battery  of  the  Twelve 
Apostles  there  lived  an  old  fisherman  named  Lesmes.  He 
had  been  a  collector  for  Poey  and  was  knowledgeable  in 
all  sorts  of  ways.  We  questioned  him  and  he  said,  "Yes, 
there  is  a  cave  back  in  the  scrub,  several  miles  from  here, 
which  has  shrimp  in  it  which  look  as  though  they  had 
been  boiled."  The  upshot  was  we  started  out  to  find  the 
cave.  We  wandered  through  the  hot,  dusty  growth  of 
beach-grape  trees  for  a  couple  of  miles  and  came  to  what 
had  obviously  once  been  a  small  cave,  the  roof  of  which 
had  fallen  in. 

Sure  enough,  swimming  about  in  the  crystal-clear  water, 
which  here  stood  quite  near  the  surface  of  the  ground, 
were  to  be  seen  fairy  shrimps  of  the  most  heavenly  crimson 
hue,  slender  and  most  delicately  formed,  with  white  tips 
to  their  appendages,  as  if  they  had  stepped  about  delicately 
in  white  ink.  We  collected  a  number  of  these  and  in  due 
season  sent  them  to  Miss  Mary  Rathbun,  the  famous  car- 
cinologist  of  the  Smithsonian  Institution.  She  wrote  me 


82  Naturalist  at  Large 

that  these  shrimps  were  unique,  the  only  members  of  the 
family  Hippolytidae  that  had  taken  to  cave  life.  The  mem- 
bers of  this  family  inhabit  the  deep  sea  and  a  vast  number 
of  deep-sea  Crustacea  are  red.  All  other  cave  shrimps  which 
I  know  of,  like  most  other  cavicolous  animals,  are  pure 
white.  She  named  this  shrimp  Barbouria  poeyi,  which 
pleased  me  very  much. 

I  am  going  to  digress  for  a  moment  at  this  point  and  say 
something  about  zoological  names.  There  is  always  a 
generic  name  written  with  a  capital,  and  a  specific  name, 
and  sometimes  also  a  subspecific,  always  written  in  lower 
case.  The  manufacturing  or  thinking  up  of  generic  names 
is  not  always  easy,  since  you  have  to  think  of  names  which 
have  not  been  used  before,  and  the  number  of  names  that 
have  been  used  mounts  into  many  thousands.  Therefore  a 
person  with  a  name  which  works  up  reasonably  eupho- 
niously is  a  good  deal  of  a  godsend  to  describers;  so  we 
have  Barbourella,  Barbourina,  Barbouricthys,  Barbouro- 
phis,  Barbourula,  and  I  think  several  other  such  combina- 
tions, all  shpping  off  the  tongue  with  reasonable  comfort. 

But  consider  the  way  Dybowski,  for  instance,  has  trans- 
gressed, and  some  of  the  names  which  he  has  proposed  for 
free-swimming  Crustacea  in  Lake  Baikal:  Leiicophtahiw- 
echinogainmarus  leucophthahms,  Stenophthahnoechijio- 
gannnanis  stenopbthalmus,  Corimtoky todermogavmmrus 
cornutuSj  and,  best  of  all,  Brachyuropushkydermatogam- 
rnarus  greivinglii  vmemonotus.  I  call  this  dirty  ball.  Thank 
God  these  have  all  been  outlawed  by  unanimous  consent 
of  one  of  the  International  Zoological  Congresses. 

Not  long  ago  I  had  occasion  to  make  some  rather  nasty 


The  Sea  and  the  Cave  8  3 

remarks  about  some  perfectly  good  friends  of  mine  who 
perpetrated  such  a  name  as  Fhotichthys  nonsuchae.  Pretty- 
terrible,  for  "nonsuch"  can  be  translated  into  decent  Latin. 
But  my  friends  were  not  classicists;  otherwise,  naming  a  fish 
seen  and  not  caught  —  in  itself  a  mortal  sin  —  Bathyspbera 
intacta  would  not  have  been  used  and  naively  interpreted 
as  "the  untouchable  bathysphere  fish." 

But  to  get  back  to  our  caves.  Cuba,  like  many  other  lime- 
stone countries,  abounds  in  caves  and  grottoes  of  all  sorts, 
and  I  have  explored  any  number  of  them.  Three,  however, 
stand  out  particularly. 

There  is  a  Httle  range  of  limestone  hills  a  couple  of  miles 
east  of  the  Harvard  Botanical  Garden  at  Soledad  in  a  pas- 
ture called  El  Portero  de  los  Vilches.  Here  there  is  a  shal- 
low cave  in  the  face  of  a  chff  which  was  used  years  ago 
as  a  bivouac  or  lookout  by  both  the  Spaniards  and  the 
Cuban  rebels  —  whichever  happened  to  be  in  control  of 
the  area.  This  cave  is  known  as  La  Cueva  de  la  Macha.  It  is 
open  to  the  light,  a  great  domed  chamber,  the  front  of 
which  fell  off  and  crashed  down  the  hill  years  ago.  Wind- 
blown dust  has  been  carried  in  in  the  course  of  the  ages 
and  the  floor  of  the  cave  has  been  covered  with  a  foot  or 
two  of  dust. 

We  visited  the  cave  often,  as  it  was  within  walking 
distance  of  the  Soledad  plantation.  Scattered  over  the  sur- 
face of  the  dust  in  the  cave  were  the  remains  of  desiccated 
owl  castings.  These  contained  the  undigested  bones  of  in- 
troduced European  mice  and  rats.  It  occurred  to  us  that  if 
we  got  down  deeper  in  the  dust  we  might  find  the  remains 
of  animals  which  existed  before  the  coming  of  the  Span- 


84  Naturalist  at  Large 

iards.  This  turned  out  to  be  the  case,  and  we  dug,  sifted, 
and  screened  on  many  occasions.  We  found  the  bones  of 
a  number  of  extinct  animals  and,  to  top  it  all,  the  only  ab- 
solutely perfect  skull  of  the  extinct  rodent  Boromys  torrei 
which  has  ever  been  found  anywhere. 

A  visit  to  a  second  Cuban  cave  also  turned  out  to  be 
extremely  valuable.  My  young  friend  Victor  Rodriguez 
and  I  set  forth  from  Havana  to  Matanzas  and  there 
changed  cars  to  a  little  branch  railroad  which  ran  down 
into  the  Black  Belt  of  Cuba,  the  southern  part  of  Matanzas 
Province.  We  got  off  the  train  at  Alacranes,  not  far  from 
the  larger  village  of  Union  de  Reyes,  and  inquired  for 
La  Cueva  del  M. 

We  found  it  was  in  an  area  mostly  planted  out  in  cane 
and  we  chartered  an  old,  broken-down  victoria,  drove  as 
far  as  the  road  would  allow,  and  then  walked  on.  The 
cave  was  as  easy  to  explore  as  any  I  have  ever  seen.  We 
entered  through  a  great  open  archway  and  descended  by 
a  gradual  inclined  slope  until  finally  we  came  to  a  great 
body  of  water  which  completely  covered  the  floor  of  the 
cave.  There  was  no  going  beyond  this  point.  We  could 
not  have  done  so  even  if  we  had  had  a  boat,  because  the 
roof  of  the  cave  dropped  down,  so  that  there  was  only  a 
very  short  space  between  the  roof  of  the  cave  and  the  sur- 
face of  the  water.  This  subterranean  lake  simply  swarmed 
with  life.  We  got  a  wonderful  collection  of  blind  fishes, 
finding  both  of  the  known  species  living  there  side  by  side 
with  blind  shrimps. 

When  we  reached  the  mouth  of  the  cave  on  our  return 
we  were  surrounded  by  rural  guards  and  promptly  ar- 
rested. But  thanks  to  Dr.  de  la  Torre,  we  had  credentials 


The  Sea  and  the  Cave  85 

from  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior  of  Cuba  and  we  were 
royally  treated  when  the  Rurales  discovered  our  identity. 
They  had  thought  that  we  entered  the  cave  for  the  pur- 
pose of  purloining  treasure  "known  to  be  buried  there." 
But  they  were  content  to  let  us  have  our  peculiar 
"treasure." 

A  totally  different  sort  of  cave  was  that  which  a  guajiro 
living  near  Madruga  advised  us  to  visit.  This  was  one  of 
those  deep,  dark  caves,  whose  presence  is  made  evident  by 
the  fact  that  the  roof  of  one  of  the  underground  cham- 
bers has  fallen  in.  In  this  cave  trees  had  grown  up  and  it 
was  possible  to  clamber  down  to  the  floor  through  the 
branches  of  a  tall,  scraggly  jaguey.  Once  down,  we  found 
that  the  cave  spread  out  more  or  less  in  all  directions  and 
here  one  needed  a  ball  of  string  and  candles.  We  took  off 
our  shoes  and  stockings,  rolled  our  trousers  up,  and  slithered 
off  through  the  bat  dung.  My  companions  were  Professor 
J.  Lewis  Bremer  and  EHott  Bacon. 

We  went  on  and  on,  stirring  up  myriads  of  bats,  creep- 
ing along  at  times  where  there  was  only  a  three-  or  four- 
foot  space  between  the  surface  of  the  guano  and  the  roof 
of  the  cave.  Then,  farther  along,  we  could  just  squeeze 
through  a  crack  a  couple  of  feet  wide  and  forty  feet  high. 
Finally,  when  we  were  about  tired  out  with  the  fetid  heat 
and  the  mean  going,  we  reached  a  deep,  sluggish  stream 
of  water  —  water  that  had  filtered  down,  most  of  it,  through 
the  lime  rock,  so  that  it  had  become  supercharged  with  lime 
salts. 

In  the  course  of  ages  enough  salts  had  been  given  up  to 
form  a  crust  on  the  surface  of  the  water  like  thin  ice  on  a 


86  Naturalist  at  Large 

pond  in  autumn  in  New  England.  We  cracked  this,  care- 
fully slipped  the  sheets  of  lime  rock  aside,  and  then  could 
look  down  by  the  rather  feeble  light  of  our  candles  into  a 
crystal-clear  pool.  There,  to  our  delight,  we  could  see  num- 
bers of  pure  white,  quite  obviously  blind  shrimps  — new, 
too,  to  science!  —  swimming  tranquilly  about. 

We  collected  a  series  of  these  in  a  dip  net  and  then,  to 
our  dehght  again,  found  around  the  margin  of  the  pool 
little  sow  bugs,  or  pill  bugs,  as  we  often  call  them  here  in 
New  England.  You  see  them  here  about  Boston,  slate- 
colored,  swarming  under  brickbats  or  old  boards  in  farm- 
yard or  garden.  These,  too,  were  pure  white  and  com- 
pletely without  eyes.  We  bottled  a  supply  of  specimens 
and  then  retraced  our  way,  winding  up  our  ball  of  twine 
and  making  a  good  collection  of  bats  during  the  return 
trip.  It  was  a  pleasure  to  get  back  to  the  surface  and  to 
breathe  fresh  air  again.  We  clambered  up  the  strangler  fig 
by  which  we  had  descended,  mounted  our  horses,  and  rode 
back  to  Madruga. 

Cuba  is  honeycombed  with  caves.  There  are  Innumerable 
places  where  streams  disappear  underground.  After  the 
most  torrential  rainfalls  many  areas  show  no  standing  water 
at  all.  And,  of  course,  the  story  of  the  marvelous  Bellemar 
Caves  at  Matanzas  is  well  known.  A  Chinese  was  working 
here  with  a  crowbar,  making  holes  in  a  rocky  area  to  set 
out  sisal  plants.  All  of  a  sudden,  after  a  particularly  lusty 
stroke,  his  iron  bar  slipped  from  his  hands  and  disappeared 
This  is  the  way  these  famous  caves  were  found,  and  now 
they  are  entered  by  a  long  flight  of  iron  stairs  lit  with  elec- 
tric lights,  and  enchant  with  their  beauty  thousands  of 
visitors  from  all  parts  of  the  world. 


CHAPTER  VIII 


Cub; 


o, 


N  OUR  first  trip  to  Soledad,  Cuba,  arrangements 
had  been  made  for  Rosamond  and  me  to  stay  with  a  Cap- 
tain Beal  at  Guabairo.  He  was  a  retired  Danish  sea  captain 
who  had  charge  of  the  colonia  or  section  of  the  plantation 
with  the  lovely  name,  "The  Whippoorwill."  We  went  over 
from  Soledad  on  a  track  car  and  walked  up  to  the  house. 
It  was  late  in  the  afternoon.  We  ensconced  ourselves  very 
comfortably,  found  that  evening  that  the  captain  had  a 
most  excellent  cook,  and  looked  forward  to  what  the  mor- 
row might  bring. 

We  arose  early  to  a  hurried  breakfast  and  set  out  afoot 
as  dawn  was  breaking,  that  loveHest  time  of  a  tropic  day. 
Wisps  of  fog  were  rising  from  the  fields  of  cut  cane.  Far 
away  on  the  horizon  a  feather  of  smoke  could  be  seen  above 
the  tall  smokestack  of  the  mill  of  the  adjoining  planta- 
tion, "Hormiguero,"  where  we  knew  that  before  long 
Dona  Luisa  Ponvert  would  be  having  her  armchair  brought 
out  to  where  her  highly  efficient  eye  could  survey  the  trains 
of  cane  coming  in  and  the  sacks  of  sugar  pouring  from  the 
centrifuges,  as  she  had  managed  this  great  plantation  for 
many  years.  The  house  at  Guabairo  was  on  the  edge  of  a 
rough,  scrubby  woods,  which  grew  on  soil  so  rocky  that 
it  could  not  be  put  into  cane  but  was  useful  for  producing 
fence  posts  and  firewood  for  charcoal. 

It  had  rained  during  the  night,  and  we  turned  and  walked 


88  Naturalist  at  Large 

down  a  long  lane  bordered  by  the  living  fence  posts  so 
characteristic  of  Cuba.  Fence  posts  here  are  placed  in  the 
ground  to  sprout  and  grow,  and  so  are  protected  from  the 
ravages  of  termites.  I  remember  that  the  bien  vestida  or 
well-dressed  lady  —  Gliricidia  —  was  in  bloom,  and  there 
were  gaudy  orioles  pecking  at  the  blossoms  on  the  pinon 
posts  —  rich  crimson  flowers  of  an  Erythrina.  In  the  spring 
the  hedgerows  built  of  the  Gliricidia  are  masses  of  pale 
mauve  flowers,  not  unlike  wistaria.  These  make  the  road- 
sides gay  with  color,  for  an  enormous  number  of  the  trop- 
ical trees  planted  for  roadside  shade  or  for  ornament  are 
of  somber  dark  green,  a  green  far  darker  than  we  are  ac- 
customed to  see  here  in  the  North. 

We  walked  on  until  we  reached  the  woods.  In  Cuba, 
you  do  not  find  a  beech  grove  or  a  maple  swamp  or  a 
clump  of  pines,  as  elsewhere  in  the  tropics.  There  may  be 
trees  of  a  hundred  different  species  in  an  acre,  and  as  Spanish 
has  absorbed  much  Arabic,  so  Antillean  Spanish  has  ab- 
sorbed far  more  Indian  terminology  than  our  English  has 
done  here.  I  often  love  to  mouth  over  the  sonorous  Indian 
names  of  the  trees  we  found  about  us.  Are  they  not  very 
lovely  —  ocuje,  caoba,  jucaro,  yayajabita,  acona,  yaya,  and 
innumerable  others?  I  do  not  think  we  had  been  more  than 
half  an  hour  from  the  house  when  I  found  a  rather  damp 
spot  in  the  woods  w^here  there  were  a  lot  of  loose  flat 
stones.  I  began  turning  these  over  and  before  long  was 
entranced  to  find  a  number  of  tiny  frogs,  rich  maroon 
in  color  with  golden-yellow  stripes  which  ran  from  the 
tip  of  the  snout  down  each  siJe  of  the  body.  These  were 
indescribably  lovely  little  frogs,  scarce  a  quarter  of  an 
inch  long  from  stem  to  stern,  and  I  knew  at  once  that  we 


Photos  by  Dr.  E.  G.  Stilhnan.  IQ41 


The  Harvara  Garden,  Soledad,  near  CienfueCTos,  Cuba 


Cuba  89 

had  rediscovered  Phyllobates  lifiibatus.  This  particular  frog 
had  been  lost  sight  of  for  sixty  years.  Cope  in  1862  de- 
scribed it  as  originating  in  Cuba.  But  Stejneger  and  I  sus- 
pected that  it  was  wrongly  labeled  and  that  its  home  was 
Central  American,  not  Cuban.  Now  we  were  proved 
wrong.  We  got  a  good  series,  and  it  was  well  that  we  did, 
as  the  type  specimens  in  the  U.  S.  National  Museum  from 
which  the  species  had  been  originally  described  were  dried 
up  and  worthless. 

We  collected  other  things  — I  remember  a  new  fresh- 
water crab  —  but  the  finding  of  this  lovely  little  frog,  the 
smallest  frog  which  I  know  of  in  the  world,  was  certainly 
the  high  light  of  this  particular  journey  to  Cuba.  Later  I 
found  that  they  were  quite  abundant  in  the  rocky  area 
which  we  keep  as  a  wild  plant  preserve  in  the  Botanic  Gar- 
dens and  there  countless  students  have  had  a  chance  to 
collect  and  observe  this  charming  little  creature,  whose  life 
history  was  finally  worked  out  by  Dr.  Dunn. 

Years  earlier  Stejneger  and  I  in  our  conversations  con- 
cerning the  Cuban  fauna  doubted  the  locaUty  of  another 
creature  taken  there  years  before  by  Don  Juan  Gundlach, 
a  German  naturalist  long  resident  in  Cuba.  Our  doubts 
concerned  the  little  lizard  of  a  very  archaic  family  whose 
representatives  are  rare  denizens  of  scattered  localities  be- 
tween the  southwestern  United  States  and  Panama.  We 
should  have  known  better,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  for  old  Don 
Juan  Gundlach  did  not  make  mistakes  in  the  localities  of 
the  species  which  he  described.  He  said  this  came  from 
Cape  Cruz,  the  extreme  southern  tip  of  the  island.  To  verify 
this  Don  Carlos  de  la  Torre  and  I  set  out  on  a  survey  trip, 


90  Naturalist  at  Large 

he  to  collect  mollusks  and  I  to  see  if  I  could  turn  up  Cri- 
cosaura. 

Wc  went  to  Manzanillo  and  then  by  launch  down  the 
coast  to  Niquero,  where  we  got  a  sailboat  to  go  to  the 
Cape.  We  were  late  getting  started,  and  of  course  the  wind 
died  out.  So  our  boatman  and  I  rowed  Don  Carlos  until 
about  midnight,  when  we  found  a  landing  place  behind 
the  hook  on  which  the  great  lighthouse  stands.  Our  journey 
was  delightful.  The  sea  was  as  calm  as  calm  could  be,  phos- 
phorescent, like  molten  silver.  I  believe  we  could  have 
read  a  book  by  the  light  produced  each  time  we  dipped 
our  oars,  and  each  fish  that  darted  from  our  bow  was  like 
a  meteor  in  the  sky. 

Once  a  pez  agujon,  one  of  those  hopping  billfishes,  came 
skittering  along  on  its  tail,  half  out  of  water,  and  struck 
the  gunwale  of  our  boat.  If  it  had  been  a  few  inches  higher 
out  of  water  it  might  have  injured  one  of  us  badly,  for 
these  long,  slim  fishes  (this  one  was  two  and  a  half  feet 
long),  with  a  beak  like  an  ice  pick  and  curious  bright 
green  bones,  propel  themselves  with  incredible  speed.  This 
one  had  been  frightened  by  a  porpoise  or  by  a  larger  fish, 
and  came  skittering  right  against  the  side  of  our  little 
dinghy.  Of  course  we  carried  no  light,  as  that  would  have 
invited  visits  from  other  billfish. 

We  came  ashore  to  hear  the  clanging  of  iron  shutters. 
The  lighthouse  keepers,  who  had  heard  the  bow  of  our  craft 
scrape  on  the  beach,  were  taking  no  chances,  and  we  sat 
outside  on  the  concrete  platform  around  the  lighthouse  for 
a  long  time  before  Don  Carlos  finally  persuaded  them  that 
we  were  not  bandits.  In  due  season  we  were  taken  in  and 
given  hammocks.  The  next  morning,  bright  and  early,  I  was 


Cuba  91 

out  rolling  stones,  and  within  an  hour  had  turned  up  a  tiny, 
slender  lizard  with  a  coral-red  tail,  which  was  very  obvi- 
ously our  long  unknown  friend  Cricosaura.  I  saw  several 
others,  but  they  were  fast  Httle  devils  and  I  got  only  the 
one.  However,  this  one  was  as  good  as  a  thousand  in  es- 
tablishing the  fact  that  Gundlach  was  right.  This  creature 
has  one  of  the  most  restricted  ranges  of  any  reptile  in  the 
world,  being  confined  to  an  area  in  the  immediate  neigh- 
borhood of  Cabo  Cruz,  not  much  bigger  than  Beacon 
Hill  in  Boston. 

To  me  there  is  something  particularly  appealing  about 
the  scenery  of  the  Cuban  countryside.  To  be  sure,  the 
tropical  vegetation  is  not  breath-takingly  inspiring,  as  is, 
for  instance,  that  tropical  forest  which  you  meet  between 
Puerto  Armuelles  in  western  Panama  and  the  Costa  Rican 
line.  The  wide  sweeping  cane  fields,  their  dainty  tassels 
blowing  in  the  breeze,  and  the  giant  Ceiba  trees,  which 
are  so  often  to  be  seen,  since  it  is  a  custom  never  to  cut 
them  down,  are  a  joy  to  the  eye.  These  great  umbrellas, 
their  horizontal  limbs  each  a  garden  of  epiphytic  curujeyes 
(plants  growing  on  other  plants),  as  the  bromeliads  are 
called  in  Cuba,  are  singularly  pleasing,  especially  when  the 
soft  green  foliage  comes  out  with  the  first  spring  rains. 
Then  there  are  the  wide  groves  of  stately  royal  palms, 
their  pale  gray  stalks  like  stone  columns  surmounted  by  a 
section  of  polished  green  from  which  the  long,  graceful 
fronds  sprout  forth.  These  are  used  for  thatching  and  the 
berries  are  gathered  for  pigs.  There  is  a  law  against  cut- 
ting them  down,  since  the  royal  palm  is  the  official  emblem 
of  the  Republic. 


92  Naturalist  at  Large 

Cuba  has  been  cleared  for  cultivation  probably  as  ex- 
tensively as  New  England  was  a  hundred  years  agp  and 
little  of  the  land  has  yet  begun  to  go  back  into  second 
growth,  as  a  large  part  of  New  England  has  already  done. 
Cuban  soil  is  unbelievably  fertile  and  there  are  many  fields 
on  which  cane  has  been  cut  for  a  hundred  years  without 
replanting.  Indeed,  I  know  a  valley  west  of  Havana  where 
the  topsoil  is  sixty  feet  deep,  and  while  I  miss  now  the 
high  forests  which  I  used  to  see  on  my  visits  to  Cuba  thirty 
or  more  years  ago,  I  still  enjoy  the  plantations  of  mango  and 
other  fruit  trees  which  are  found  far  and  wide  about  vil- 
lages and  sugar  mills. 

The  mango  is  one  of  the  finest  shade  trees  of  the  whole 

world,  and  the  tender  roseate  hue  of  the  long  drooping 

leaves  on  the  new-grown  shoots  is  singularly  lovely.  It  is 

strange  how  many  tropical  trees  have  this  habit  of  putting 

forth  quick-growing  shoots  with  long,  limp,  slender  leaves, 

pink  or  even  bright  red  in  color,  which  finally  harden  up 

and  become  the  firm,  typical  adult  foliage  of  dark  green. 

I  think  of  the  Browneas,  with  their  great  red  pompons  of 

flowers,  delicate  Httle  trees  and  hard  to  grow,  and  of  that 

most  glorious  of  all  the  flowering  trees  of  the  entire  world, 

Amherstia,  which  we  cannot  make  grow  in  Cuba.  We  only 

flowered  it  once  in  Soledad.  Perhaps  you  may  have  seen 

it  at  Castleton  Gardens  in  Jamaica  or  in  Trinidad,  or  best 

of  all  in  its  native  home  in  Burma.  The  flowers  are  borne 

each  like  a  tiny  bird  mounted  on  a  wire  and  each  wire 

attached,  as  it  were,  to  a  long  strand  which  hangs  down 

from  the  end  of  the  limb,  each  little  bird  crimson,  with 

boldly  painted  golden  spots. 

Unfortunately  Amherstia,  even  in  Burma,  seldom,  if 


Cuba  93 

ever,  sets  seeds,  and  the  little  plants  obtained  by  inarch- 
ing or  layering  are  extremely  delicate.  Thus  its  introduc- 
tion into  Cuba  has  proved  very  difficult  because  the  at- 
mosphere there  is  so  dry  and  the  rainfall  so  scant.  All  in 
all  we  have  brought  sbc  or  eight  plants  to  the  island  but 
none  survive  today.  I  remember  one  really  fine,  well-grown 
plant  given  us  at  Jamaica  when  I  was  on  the  Utoiua?ia.  Mr. 
Armour  agreed  to  carry  it  direct  to  Cienfuegos.  We  did. 
A  drop  of  salt  water  splashed  on  it  while  we  were  taking 
it  ashore  to  Soledad  and  withered  one  of  the  main  branches 
of  the  plant  in  an  instant.  However,  the  trunk  and  other 
branches  were  untouched  and  we  found  a  damp  spot  for 
it  under  a  giant  Pithecolobium  tree.  This  plant  lasted  for 
several  years  and  flowered  once,  but  was  ruined  with  its 
giant  protector  by  the  hurricane  of  1934.  This  was  a  sad 
blow.  We  have  never  since  been  able  to  secure  a  really 
well-established  specimen. 

Thanks  largely  to  David  Fairchild,  Florida  is  beginning 
to  provide  us  with  good  mangos,  good  alligator  pears,  and 
many  other  fruits  long  since  staple  articles  of  food  in  Cuba. 
Personally,  I  look  forward  to  the  day  when  we  may  have 
in  our  market  here  sapodillas.  In  the  Spanish-speaking  coun- 
tries we  call  them  sapotes  or  nisperos.  They  are  "dillys" 
in  the  English-speaking  colonies  —  fruit  unprepossessing 
in  appearance  with  a  brown  skin  a  good  deal  like  a  potato, 
though  without  eyes,  of  course.  But  break  it  open  and 
the  delicious  brownish  pulp  has  a  delicate  flavor  of  its 
own  and  the  black  polished  seeds  characteristic  of  the 
family  to  which  the  fruit  belongs  are  quite  artificial-look- 
ing and  decorative.  The  Mamey  Colorado  belongs  to  the 
same  family,  but  this  has  never  been  established  in  Florida, 


94  Naturalist  at  Large 

although  I  believe  there  are  one  or  two  trees  growing  in 
Key  West.  This  is  a  delicious  fruit,  which  I  believe  some 
day  we  may  expect  to  procure  in  Northern  markets,  al- 
most as  large  as  a  Rocky  Ford  melon,  the  pulp  bright  red, 
with  a  delicious  custardy  flavor. 

Who  has  not  read  Turtle  Eggs  for  Agassiz?  I  have  read 
it  time  and  again.  The  yarn  I  am  about  to  tell  has  no  such 
charm.  George  Howard  Parker  was  the  best  lecturer  to 
whom  I  ever  listened  as  an  undergraduate,  so  I  was  natu- 
rally inclined  to  help  him  when  he  asked  me  for  a  boa. 
He  wanted  the  longest  unbranched  nerve  which  he  could 
lay  hands  on,  to  study  the  elaboration  of  carbon  dioxide 
under  electrical  excitation.  I  was  going  to  Cuba.  With 
luck,  I  might  get  a  large  boa.  When  it  was  anesthetized 
and  put  under  water,  the  long  vagus  nerve  being  dissected 
out  and  electrically  stimulated,  bubbles  of  carbon  dioxide 
could  be  readily  caught  as  they  issued  from  the  water  and 
their  volume  measured.  Now  the  vagus  nerve  activates 
the  diaphragm  and  the  diaphragm  of  a  snake  is  well  aft. 
Moreover,  this  nerve  is  unbranched.  Parker  yearned  for 
a  boa. 

Before  long  I  found  myself  at  Soledad,  in  Cuba,  and  I 
passed  out  word  through  the  countryside  that  I  was  inter- 
ested in  getting  a  large  Maja,  as  boas  are  called  locally,  and 
was  not  in  the  least  interested  in  small  ones.  Soledad  in 
Cuba  is  the  site  of  Harvard's  only  little  ward  of  Paradise, 
a  lovely  botanic  garden  which  I  have  been  privileged  to 
visit  for  years.  While  I  was  sitting  on  the  front  porch  of 
Harvard  House  one  hot  and  sultry  afternoon  two  country- 
men came  up  to  the  door,  politely  doffing  their  hats,  and 


Cuba  95 

took  from  their  shoulders  a  pole  from  which  a  large  sack 
was  suspended.  The  spokesman  of  the  twain  indicated  that 
the  sack  contained  the  father  of  all  boas.  It  wasn't  long 
before  we  struck  a  bargain  and  the  snake  was  mine.  I 
dumped  him  out  of  the  sack  in  the  dark  room,  a  httle  de- 
tached stucco-and-concrete  building  adjoining  the  labora- 
tory. It  was  obvious  at  first  glance  that  the  snake  had  dined 
sumptuously  and  I  was  not  surprised  when  looking  at  him 
the  next  day  to  see  that  excitement  or  nervousness  had 
given  him  indigestion,  and  a  pile  of  highly  aromatic  cor- 
ruption on  the  floor  indicated  that  not  long  since  he  had 
consumed  no  less  than  three  hutias.  These  savory  rodents 
abound  in  the  wilder  parts  of  Cuba  and  each  one  of  these 
was  about  the  size  of  an  able  tomcat.  I  got  the  hose  and  the 
broom  and  went  to  it,  slicked  the  place  up,  and  the  buz- 
zards took  care  of  the  situation  in  a  few  moments. 

Time  to  leave.  With  some  help,  I  crowded  Epicrates,  as 
I  may  call  our  victim,  for  this  is  his  generic  scientific  name, 
into  a  strong  carton,  the  kind  that  has  four  f!aps,  one  on 
each  end  and  one  on  each  side,  pressed  them  down, 
and  tied  up  the  bundle.  I  was  forced  to  spend  a  few  days 
in  Havana,  and  Epicrates  resided  under  my  bed  in  the 
Inglaterra  Hotel.  The  next  day  I  crossed  to  Key  West. 
Prohibition  was  in  full  swing  and  no  customhouse  official 
was  going  to  pass  a  carton  on  my  mere  statement  that 
it  contained  a  snake;  but  one  peek  settled  the  matter  and 
the  bundle  was  re-corded  and  carried  to  the  train.  I  had 
the  southernmost  lower  in  the  north-bound  car  for  Palm 
Beach.  We  left  in  the  evening  and  the  car  was  to  reach 
Palm  Beach  early  the  next  morning  and  to  be  placed  on  a 
siding  for  the  convenience  of  its  passengers. 


96  Naturalist  at  Large 

I  walked  around  Key  West  to  kill  time,  got  aboard,  and 
turned  in  about  as  the  train  was  leaving.  I  went  to  sleep. 
I  am  a  very  light  sleeper,  and  slept  perhaps  a  little  more 
lightly  than  usual  on  this  occasion.  At  any  rate,  in  the  dead 
of  night  I  heard  a  sudden  sharp  yelp.  I  knew  at  once  that 
something  was  wrong  and  I  reached  over  and  twiddled  the 
carton.  It  was  obviously  empty.  Nothing  to  do  but  wait 
till  morning.  The  hours  dragged,  but  finally  daylight  came. 
I  waited  patiently  until  everyone  had  left  the  car;  then  I 
went  and  asked  the  porter  what  had  happened.  He  said 
that  he  had  been  asleep  in  the  men's  washroom,  having 
set  his  alarm  watch  so  that  he  would  have  time  to  clean 
the  shoes  of  the  passengers  who  were  to  get  off  at  Miami. 
He  awoke  and,  lo  and  behold,  there  was  the  snake,  which 
had  escaped  from  my  carton,  crawled  the  whole  length  of 
the  car  and  entered  the  men's  washroom,  where  it  fright- 
ened the  Negro  almost  to  death.  Luckily,  the  diner  was 
the  adjoining  car.  The  porter  rushed  in  and  got  a  cleaver, 
chopped  the  head  off  the  snake,  then  opened  the  vestibule 
door  and  pushed  it  out.  I  pretended  to  be  tremendously 
surprised.  I  was  carrying  the  empty  carton  and  told  the 
porter  it  contained  objects  too  fragile  to  entrust  to  any- 
one else. 

After  I  had  set  it  down  and  he  had  brought  out  my  other 
impedimenta,  I  asked  him  how  he  could  account  for  this 
extraordinary  chain  of  events.  He  allowed  he  didn't  know. 
I  asked  him  if  by  chance  he  had  left  the  car  on  the  siding 
in  Key  West  the  day  before  with  its  door  open.  He  said 
yes,  he  had.  "And,"  I  added,  "you  went  up  town  sparking 
the  gals."  And  again  he  admitted  that  I  was  right.  I  advised 
him  that  he  should  always  shut  the  door  of  his  car  there- 


Cuba  97 

after.  He  assured  me  that  he  would  never  make  that  mis- 
take again. 

The  history  of  the  Garden  at  Soledad  in  Cuba  has  been 
written  over  and  over  again.  The  story  of  how  Mr.  Edwin 
F.  Atkins  acquired  the  Soledad  Plantation  is  told  in  his 
book  Sixty  Years  in  Cuba,  incidentally  one  of  the  best  books 
on  the  island  that  have  ever  been  written;  how  he  consulted 
Professor  Goodale  and  Professor  Oakes  Ames,  got  Mr. 
Gray  to  be  Superintendent,  hybridized  sugar  canes,  and  be- 
gan the  gradual  accumulation  of  a  collection  of  tropical 
plants  over  forty  years  ago. 

I  first  visited  Soledad  in  1909,  and  as  I  was  specializing 
in  a  study  of  the  fauna  of  the  West  Indies  and  for  many 
years  studied  the  fauna  of  Cuba  intensively,  I  came  more 
and  more  to  avail  myself  most  gratefully  of  the  Atkinses' 
hospitality  at  Soledad  Plantation.  During  the  years  of  the 
last  great  war  I  was  in  Cuba  all  the  time  as  a  government 
agent  and  frequently  spent  week  ends  at  Soledad.  I  be- 
came more  and  more  interested  in  the  possibilities  of  the 
place. 

In  time  Mr.  Lowell  appointed  me  Custodian  of  the  Gar- 
den and  I  have  had  to  do  with  planning  itr  development 
in  a  fairly  intimate  way  for  some  twenty  years  or  more. 
I  have  built  dams  and  made  ponds  and  watched  their  bor- 
ders change  from  those  of  poor  old  worn-out  cane  fields 
to  veritable  fairylands.  From  time  to  time,  until  he  died, 
I  begged  more  and  more  land  from  Mr.  Atkins,  always 
with  success,  and  since  then  from  his  son-in-law,  William 
H.  Claflin.  These  friends  have  always  given  me  whole- 
hearted and  enthusiastic  appreciation  of  any  plans  I  had 


98  Naturalist  at  Large 

to  offer  for  the  development  of  what  is  now  one  of  the 
great  tropical  gardens  of  the  world. 

Harvard  House,  its  laboratory,  airy  dining  hall,  and 
accommodations  for  six  persons  soon  became  outgrown, 
for  while  this  offered  sufficient  accommodation  for  the 
visitors  who  came  during  the  wintertime,  in  summer  groups 
of  students  with  an  instructor  began  making  increasing  use 
of  our  facihties.  So  then  Mrs.  Atkins  and  I  built  Casa  Cata- 
lina  on  the  top  of  a  high  ridge  looking  out  over  the  Gar- 
den to  the  Trinidad  Mountains.  Here  there  are  a  good 
big  dormitory  and  several  private  rooms,  so  that  now  we 
can  take  care  of  as  many  students  as  we  are  ever  likely 
to  have. 

Our  collection  of  palms  is  only  exceeded  in  variety  by 
that  of  Colonel  Robert  H.  Montgomery  at  Coconut  Grove 
in  Florida,  and  our  ornamental  and  useful  hardwood  trees 
—  teak  and  the  like  —  are  now  big  enough  so  that  we  can 
supply  seeds  to  anybody  who  needs  them.  Soledad  Planta- 
tion itself  has  flourishing  forest  plantings  to  provide  future 
railway  ties  grown  from  our  seed.  For  this  Garden  is  not 
simply  ornamental,  but  serves  a  useful  purpose,  introduc- 
ing and  testing  economic  plants  from  all  over  the  tropical 
world. 

One  of  the  sure  satisfactions  of  a  life  extraordinarily 
blessed  with  satisfactory  events  has  been  the  many,  many 
restful  hours  which  I  have  spent  alone  watching  the  birds 
in  a  setting  of  entrancing  beauty,  a  setting  which  changes 
every  year.  I  thought  the  place  was  ruined  when  I  saw  it 
after  the  great  hurricane  of  1934,  but  in  1941,  when  last  I 
was  there,  all  signs  of  the  hurricane  were  completely  gone, 
such  is  the  rapidity  of  plant  growth  in  the  tropics.  The 


Cuba  99 

stately  clusters  of  bamboo,  the  flowering  trees  of  early- 
spring,  the  ponds  reflecting  the  magnificent  trees  which 
grow  on  their  banks,  afford  scenes  of  extraordinary  loveli- 
ness. Moreover,  now  there  is  a  good  road  to  our  very  door 
and  one  can  motor  out  from  Havana  in  about  seven  hours 
without  unreasonable  haste.  As  the  beauty  of  the  Garden 
becomes  more  widely  known,  the  number  of  visitors  in- 
creases, and  anyone  who  is  really  interested  in  Harvard 
College  cannot  but  be  proud  of  its  lovely  outpost  in  Cuba. 

Some  years  ago  the  University  of  Havana  celebrated  its 
two  hundredth  anniversary.  After  the  party  was  over  and 
the  delegates  had  gone  home,  James  Brown  Scott  of  our 
State  Department  and  I  remained  behind,  for  we  had  been 
told  that  a  special  convocation  was  to  be  held  and  we  were 
to  receive  honorary  degrees.  I  wired  Boston,  and  my  wife 
came  down  with  my  gown.  No  borrowed  gown  available 
in  Havana  would  fit  my  bulk. 

The  fateful  day  was  still  and  coppery  hot  —  one  of  those 
spring  mornings  in  the  tropics  when  it  wants  to  rain  but 
can't  and  the  trade  wind  forgets  to  blow.  I  put  on  my  gown 
and  fell  in  line.  The  ceremony  was  dignified  and  colorful 
in  the  extreme.  Scott  wore  the  red  cape  of  a  Doctor  of 
Laws  and  I  the  sky-blue  cape  of  a  Doctor  of  Science.  The 
placing  of  the  biretta  on  our  heads  was  the  mark  of  the 
bestowal  of  the  degree. 

Scott  went  through  his  paces  first,  made  a  good  speech, 
was  orated  at,  and  received  the  degree.  He  was  just  about 
the  same  size  as  the  Rector  of  the  University.  Then  came 
my  turn.  I  made  an  oration  in  my  most  polite  Spanish.  My 
old  friend,  Don  Carlos  de  la  Torre,  made  me  turn  as  red 


100  Naturalist  at  Large 

as  a  lobster  by  the  things  he  said  about  me.  And  my  wife, 
who  was  sitting  in  the  front  row  before  us  buried  in  a 
mass  of  tropical  floral  tributes,  blushed  as  Don  Carlos 
recalled  that  the  cannibals  of  New  Guinea  had  said  they 
preferred  to  look  at  her,  which  was  why  she  was  not 
eaten. 

Don  Carlos  finally  sat  down,  and  I  rose  for  the  em- 
brace. I  stepped  forward  and  put  my  arms  around  the  Rec- 
tor and  patted  him  three  times  on  the  back,  according  to 
ancient  usage.  Well,  when  I  did  this  he  completely  dis- 
appeared, for  I  am  distinctly  outsize,  being  almost  six  feet 
six  in  height,  while  the  Rector  was  short  even  for  a  Cuban. 
A  voice  from  the  gallery  said  in  Spanish,  "There  goes 
Cuba!"  This  was  just  about  the  time  that  the  "Octopus 
of  the  North"  was  disciplining  Haiti  and  San  Domingo,  for 
excellent  reasons,  and  Cuba  was  inclined  to  take  sides  with 
its  neighbors.  However,  in  a  second  the  Rector  was  un- 
folded and  breathing  again.  I  sat  down,  the  biretta  on  my 
head,  and  as  I  did  so  the  sweep  of  my  ample  sleeve  tipped 
a  gargantuan  goblet  of  water  into  the  lap  of  the  Dean  of 
the  Faculty  of  Sciences,  who  was  sitting  beside  me.  He  was 
extremely  polite,  but  a  little  annoyed.  I  felt  like  an  ass; 
in  reality  it  was  the  proudest  day  of  my  life  — the  first 
really  distinguished  honor  I  ever  received. 

Now  the  scene  changes.  I  am  back  in  Boston  and  it  is 
the  Harvard  Commencement  season.  On  the  Sunday  eve- 
ning before  this  event  I  sat  in  what  was  called  the  Sunday 
School  at  the  Somerset  Club,  a  pleasant  after-dinner  gather- 
ing. I  was  telling  my  friend  Herbert  Leeds  about  the  Ha- 
vana ceremony;  I  described  the  gown.  This  is  of  shiny, 


Photo  by  Dr.  E.  G.  Stillman 

The  author  and  "Lizzie"  at  Soledad,  1941 


Photo  hv  Luis  Ho'ii'dl  Rircro 


On  the  steps  at  the  Aula  Alagna,  University  of  Havana 

March  19^0 


Cuba  101 

lustrous  silk,  full  In  the  skirt  but  with  tight  sleeves,  deco- 
rated with  a  deep  lace  cuif,  white  on  the  black.  A  sky-blue 
cape  is  worn  over  the  shoulders,  while  the  headdress  or 
biretta  is  of  blue  silk  with  a  large  pompon  of  blue  silk 
threads  which  reminds  one  somewhat  of  the  rear  end  of  a 
Pomeranian.  Mr.  Leeds  said,  "I  have  twenty-five  dollars 
which  says  that  you  won't  dare  wear  that  next  Thursday." 
I  said,  "You're  on." 

Commencement  Day  came.  I  went  to  Cambridge;  put  on 
my  regalia.  I  was  to  be  Marshal  for  the  candidates  for  the 
degrees  from  A.M.  to  Theology;  in  other  words,  the  sec- 
ond half  of  the  candidates'  procession.  What  I  didn't  know, 
however,  was  that  because  Harvard's  ex-Treasurer,  CharHe 
Adams,  had  been  made  Secretary  of  the  Navy  and  was 
to  receive  an  honorary  degree,  the  press  cameramen  were 
to  be  allowed  in  the  Yard  for  the  first  time  in  history.  A 
platform  had  been  made  at  the  corner  of  University  Hall  on 
which  they  might  stand. 

Ten  o'clock  struck,  the  band  started  up,  and  Roger  Mer- 
riman  led  off  the  A.B.'s.  All  went  well  until  Lewis  Bremer 
and  I,  with  our  second  division  of  the  procession,  reached 
the  front  of  the  press  stand.  Then  something  happened; 
the  line  halted.  A  rich  Irish  voice,  subdued  but  yet  quite 
audible,  said  to  its  neighbor,  "Who  the  hell  is  the  big 
bloke  wrapped  up  in  the  blue  diploma?"  The  other  re- 
plied, "I'll  go  and  find  out."  He  jumped  down,  ran  a  few 
steps  to  the  Yard  cop,  and  whispered  in  his  ear.  He  jumped 
back  to  the  platform  and  said  in  a  very  audible  whisper, 
"His  name  is  Barbour  and  he  runs  the  Agassiz  Museum." 
No.  I  said,  "He  looks  like  the  Pope's  mistress!"  The  re- 
joinder to  that  was,  "Would  you  say  Pope  Boniface  or 


102  Naturalist  at  Large 

Pope  Innocent?"  "There's  nothing  innocent  about  that 
face." 

At  this  point,  thank  God,  the  line  began  moving.  I 
marched  on,  unbelievably  reheved.  I  vowed  never  to  wear 
that  gown  again,  though  I  have  from  time  to  time  sported 
the  blue  muzetta  with  my  ordinary  American  doctor's 
gown.  This  does  not  have  tight  sleeves  with  a  deep  border 
of  white  lace  and  a  skirt  effect  that  looks  extraordinarily 
as  if  one  were  wearing  a  bustle  under  a  Mother  Hubbard. 

I  suppose  if  we  wanted  to  indicate  that  a  man  had 
become  a  real  North  Carolinian  we  should  say  that  he  had 
tar  on  his  heel.  In  the  same  way  the  Cubans  speak  of  a  per- 
son as  being  aplatajtado,  that  is,  "bananaed,"  to  indicate 
colloquially  that  he  has  become  pretty  completely  ac- 
climated. Well,  my  Cuban  friends  say  that  I  am  ^'im  h ombre 
Men  aplatanado.^'  Personally,  I  consider  this  a  great  compli- 
ment. If  I  grow  loquacious  and  prolix  when  it  comes  to 
talking  about  Cuba  I  do  not  care  a  rap,  for  I  love  the 
country  with  a  deep,  passionate  affection.  I  have  no  hesi- 
tation in  saying  so,  and  I  do  not  care  whether  my  friends 
believe  it  or  not.  My  Cuban  friends  do,  and  that  is  all  that 
counts. 


CHAPTER  IX 

The  Bahamas,  Old  and  New 


I 


HAVE  been  asked  more  than  once  why  I  have  de- 
voted so  large  a  part  of  my  life  to  studies  connected  with 
the  Bahama  Islands.  The  answer  is  that  I  have  been  gov- 
erned partly  by  sentiment  and  partly  by  chance.  The  fact 
that  Allison  Armour  liked  to  cruise  in  the  Bahamas  gave 
me  a  number  of  opportunities  to  visit  islands  which  were 
normally  inconvenient  of  access  and  I  was  swayed  by  senti- 
ment because  it  was  here  that  my  grandmother  first  in- 
troduced me  to  the  tropics,  an  experience  which,  as  I  have 
explained,  played  a  very  large  part  in  determining  my  hfe's 
work. 

The  Bahamas  are  a  happy  hunting  ground.  To  be  sure 
they  have  a  depauperate  fauna  but  the  question  is,  was 
that  always  so?  I  think  the  answer  is  no.  We  know  from 
early  historical  accounts  that  some  of  the  islands  were 
forested  and  there  are  other  reasons  for  believing  that  this 
was  the  case.  Many  a  stately  gateway  now  standing  in  what 
is  pitiful  scrub  vegetation  on  rocky  sterile  soil  is  the  only 
remains  of  the  rich  sea-island  cotton  plantations  which 
existed  before  the  days  of  British  emancipation.  I  imagine 
that  probably  even  before  this  time  the  temptation  to 
clear  land  with  fire  had  initiated  the  work  of  destruction. 
Burning  and  reburning  have  consumed  the  humus  and 
most  of  the  islands  are  now  desolate  indeed.  If  only  the 
cave  earth  had  not  been  so  rich  in  fertilizing  value  that 


104  Naturalist  at  Large 

almost  every  single  cave  had  been  cleared  out  long  ago 
we  should  have  had  an  immense  amount  of  evidence  not 
available  now. 

What  would  I  not  have  given  to  have  had  a  chance  to 
sift  the  earth  out  of  those  caves  before  it  was  all  dug  out 
and  spread  over  the  land!  Recently  a  schoolteacher  on 
the  island  of  Exuma  sent  up  to  Cambridge  the  contents  of 
a  little  pocket  in  a  cave  which  had  been  almost,  but  not 
quite,  emptied  of  its  cave  earth.  This  contained  the  bones 
of  a  number  of  fossil  birds  which  when  submitted  to  Dr. 
Alexander  Wetmore,  the  director  of  the  National  Museum 
and  our  first  authority  on  fossil  birds,  showed  the  presence 
long  ago  of  species  now  extinct,  and  a  genus,  also,  of 
birds  completely  tied  up  with  a  high  forest  environment 
—  and  yet  we  had  only  a  tiny  and  pitiful  sample  for  study. 
In  the  same  way  on  half  a  dozen  scattered  islands  I  have 
found  little  remnant  pockets  of  undisturbed  earth  which 
showed  the  presence  of  extinct  forms  of  a  genus  of  rodents 
of  which  today  there  is  only  a  single  remnant,  the  little 
population  of  guinea-pig-like  rodents  on  East  Plana  Cay. 

These  little  rodents  are  of  the  genus  Geocapromys,  and 
were  probably  once  very  much  more  widespread  than  they 
are  now.  One  species  is  confined  to  the  high  mountains  of 
eastern  Jamaica  and  is  very  scarce.  There  was  one  in  Cuba 
which  is  now  extinct  but  of  which  I  have  found  remains  in 
many  caves.  Then  there  is  another  which  swarms  on  Little 
Swan  Island  off  Honduras,  and  of  course  the  one  which 
I  have  mentioned  as  occurring  on  East  Plana  Cay.  There 
is  no  indication  whatever  that  it  ever  occurred  on  the 
mainland,  which  may  seem  a  surprising  statement  in  view 
of  the  fact  that  I  speak  of  one  occurring  on  Little  Swan 


The  Bahamas,  Old  and  New  105 

Island,  but  these  islands  in  the  Bay  of  Honduras  have  a 
mysterious  Antillean  tinge  to  their  fauna.  When  the  Uto- 
wa7m  stopped  at  Coxen's  Hole  at  Ruatan  I  found  there  a 
tree  lizard  (which  I  call  Anolis  allisoni  for  our  gracious 
host)  which  was  closely  alHed  to  a  species  of  Anoles  with 
representatives  on  the  Cayman  Island,  Cuba,  Jamaica, 
Haiti,  and  the  Bahamas.  This  group  of  lizards  is  so  sharply 
set  aside  from  the  scores  of  others  in  the  same  genus  that 
it  almost  deserves  a  generic  name. 

Allison  put  David  Fairchild,  James  Greenway,  and  me 
ashore  on  East  Plana,  where  as  usual  we  made  a  grand 
haul  of  the  land  shells  which  abound  everywhere  in  the 
Bahamas,  and  where  also  we  collected  some  fine  specimens 
of  G.  ingrahcnm.  These  were  the  only  specimens  which 
have  been  taken  since  the  types  were  secured  long  ago. 
The  remains  in  the  caves  may  mean  that  these  little  rodents 
were  eaten  by  the  early  inhabitants  of  the  islands.  Recent 
explorations  have  greatly  increased  the  number  of  animals 
known  to  have  existed  on  all  of  the  Greater  Antilles,  but 
this  evidence  has  mostly  been  derived  from  undisturbed 
caves  or  from  caves  where  dripping  supercharged  lime 
water  has  formed  a  breccia  that  has  protected  the  bones  by 
encapsulating  them  with  lime. 

The  northern  Bahamas  with  their  flat  pine-clad  plains 
probably  never  had  a  very  varied  vegetation;  I  suspect 
they  have  always  been  much  less  fertile  than  the  southern 
Bahamas  which  supported  what  we  know  was  a  spacious 
and  gracious  plantation  life.  Planters  could  once  afford  to 
send  their  own  horses  to  faraway  Jamaica  to  participate 
in  the  big  races  there,  but  today  the  islands  are  completely 
poverty-stricken.  The  answer  is  of  course  fire.  After  eman- 


106  Naturalist  at  Large 

cipation  days  the  planters  perforce  moved  away  and  the 
freed  slaves,  being  left  behind,  took  the  easiest  way  and  as 
land  grew  up  to  brush  they  cleared  and  recleared  by  burn- 
ing it  off,  until  now  on  such  islands  as  Cat  Island,  Long 
Island,  Crooked  Island,  Acklins  Island,  Eleuthera,  Exuma, 
Mariguana,  and  Great  Inagua,  only  the  most  pitiful  rem- 
nants of  gardens  remain.  The  considerable  population  nat- 
urally has  to  support  itself  to  a  large  extent  from  the  sea. 

Many  of  the  resident  birds  peculiar  to  the  islands  are 
extremely  local  and  restricted  in  distribution.  I  think  par- 
ticularly of  the  beautiful  Nye's  woodpecker.  This  occurs 
in  a  sort  of  swale  in  the  Victoria  Hills  Section  of  Watlings 
Island.  Here  there  is  a  growth  of  large  gumbo-limbo  trees 
(Bursera  guttifera).  The  area  is  so  restricted  that  I  doubt 
if  the  total  population  of  this  lovely  species  amounts  to  more 
than  thirty  to  forty  pairs.  These  big  trees  are  no  doubt  a 
good  sample  of  what  once  grew  more  or  less  everywhere. 
Elsewhere  the  forests  were  weakened  by  fire.  The  big 
trees  not  actually  destroyed  by  the  fire  itself  were  re- 
moved by  the  devastating  hurricanes  which  pass  over  these 
unfortunate  islands  more  frequently  than  elsewhere. 

How  have  the  creatures  moved  from  one  island  to  an- 
other? The  number  of  genera  of  reptiles  with  representa- 
tive species  on  the  various  islands  is  really  very  considerable. 
However,  I  think  this  not  really  difficult  to  explain.  There 
has  been  some  fortuitous  dispersal  by  flotsam  and  jet- 
sam motivated  by  hurricanes  no  doubt.  But  during  several 
glacial  epochs  when  a  large  quantity  of  oceanic  water  was 
tied  up  in  the  form  of  polar  ice  the  surface  of  the  sea  wa? 
certainly  lowered  sufficiently  to  change  the  Bahama  Archi- 
pelago to  its  present  condition.  I  believe  this  made  large 


The  Bahamas,  Old  and  New  107 

land  masses  of  what  are  now  groups  of  many  separate  is- 
lands. I  also  believe  there  may  have  been  a  lot  of  down- 
thrusting  of  fault  blocks  in  the  Bahamas.  It  is  impossible 
even  to  guess  when  this  occurred  but  there  are  many 
reasons  to  postulate  isostatic  disequilibrium  in  the  whole 
Bahamas-Greater  Antillean  area. 

I  agree  with  those  geologists  who  believe  that  the  Yunque 
of  Baracoa  in  Cuba  (well-named  the  anvil  because  it  is  a 
great  steep-sided  block  of  a  mountain)  and  the  similar- 
looking  Morro  of  Monte  Criste  in  the  Dominican  Repub- 
lic are  upthrust  fault  blocks,  and  the  channels  between 
the  islands  with  their  steep  walls  dropping  off  quite  close 
to  shore  are  perhaps  compensatory  downthrust  blocks. 
While  the  Bahamas  are  flat  the  Greater  Antilles  are  moun- 
tainous. A  vast  predominance  of  limestone  has  gone  into 
their  make-up.  Of  course  this  limestone  has  made  possible 
the  perfectly  unbelievable  variety  of  mollusks  that  are  to 
be  found  there.  Hundreds  of  valid  species  have  been  de- 
scribed and  the  end  is  not  yet  by  any  manner  of  means. 
Collecting  mollusks  in  this  part  of  the  world  is  a  most 
fascinating  pastime.  The  species,  many  of  them,  are  un- 
believably beautiful  and  although  they  have  a  tantalizing 
way  of  disappearing  in  dry  weather  it  only  takes  a  shower 
or  two  to  bring  them  forth  in  utterly  incredible  swarms. 

I  had  an  opportunity  to  visit  the  island  of  Great  Inagua 
on  several  occasions.  Matthewtown,  its  principal  settlement, 
was  a  dreary  relic  of  what  once  obviously  was  a  place  of 
some  importance.  The  great  salt  pans  behind  the  town  were 
interesting  only  because  of  the  presence  of  a  few  strag- 
gling flamingos,  while  the  animal  life  of  the  island  had 


108  Naturalist  at  Large 

suffered  from  the  introduction  of  a  more  curious  job  lot 
of  beasts  than  most  island  faunae  have  to  cope  with.  Feral 
cats  and  rats  abounded;  also  donkeys,  wild  cattle,  and,  I 
have  heard  it  said,  even  hogs  and  horses.  At  any  rate  the 
scrubby  vegetation  surrounding  the  great  saline  ponds  in 
the  middle  of  the  island  reminded  one  a  good  deal  of  East 
Africa  as  a  drove  of  timid  jackasses  would  scamper  off 
ahead  of  the  intruder. 

James  Greenway,  who  was  much  more  agile  than  I,  suc- 
ceeded in  landing  on  Sheep  Cay,  a  tiny  isolated  remnant 
of  the  greater  islands  separated  by  but  a  short  strait  of 
salt  water  from  Inagua  itself.  But  this  stretch  of  salt  water 
had  saved  the  day  as  far  as  I  was  concerned,  for  Jim  waded 
out  to  where  we  could  pick  him  up,  carrying  a  canvas 
bag  which  he  had  taken  ashore,  and  which  now  contained 
two  treasures.  One  was  a  handsome  little  species  of  boa 
which  turned  out  to  be  completely  new,  the  other  a  very 
distinct  Alsophis.  I  suspect  that  these  once  were  abundant 
all  over  Inagua  and  that  they  have  been  extirpated  by  the 
introduced  vermin.  At  any  rate  as  far  as  I  know  no  one 
had  ever  found  them  on  the  large  island  and  it  had  been 
visited  by  a  number  of  naturalists. 

Now  comes  the  remarkable  part  of  my  story.  William, 
Josiah,  and  Douglas  Erickson  made  a  careful  scientific 
search  of  the  possibilities  of  utilizing  the  old  salt  pans,  and 
through  Josiah  (whom  we  all  call  Jim,  and  who  was  one 
of  the  first  of  my  many  honorary  nephews)  I  have  been 
able  to  keep  track  of  what  these  wonderful  young  men 
have  done.  To  be  sure  the  name  of  Erickson  is  synonymous 
with  ingenuity.  Think  of  the  Monitor  in  the  Civil  War 
and  the  screw  propeller  on  every  steamer.  I  need  say  no 


The  Bahamas^  Old  and  New  109 

more.  I  wrote  Jim  and  asked  if  he  would  be  willing  to  tell 
the  story  of  what  he  and  his  family  have  done  with  Inagua. 
Here  it  is:  — 

West  India  Chemicals,  Limited 
Matthewtown,  Inagua,  Bahamas 

February  /^,  ip^^ 
Dr.  Thomas  Barbour, 
M.  C  Z., 

Harvard  University, 
Cambridge,  Massachusetts. 

Dear  Uncle  Tommie: 

Sorry  to  have  had  to  delay  this  but  the  pressure  of 
work  has  been  considerable  and  time  has  just  not  been 
available.  You  asked  for  an  account  of  the  changes 
which  have  taken  place  here  since  your  last  visit  and 
I  will  try  to  give  you  a  rough  picture  of  what  we  have 
had  to  contend  with  and  what  developments  have 
taken  place. 

You  were  quite  familiar  with  the  physical  aspect 
of  the  town  as  it  existed  upon  our  arrival.  To  go  with 
the  picture  of  an  almost  nonexistent  standard  of  liv- 
ing, we  found  the  usual  accompanying  lawlessness, 
an  attitude  which  was  shared  by  practically  all  in- 
dividuals of  the  local  population.  Everyone  was  gath- 
ered more  or  less  tightly  under  the  leadership  of  three 
or  four  individuals  who  tried  to  hold  local  superiority 
by  means  of  an  apathetic  sort  of  gang  warfare.  The 
one  business  was  that  of  stevedoring  on  steamers  ply- 
ing to  South  America  and  Europe.  As  Matthewtown 
was  a  port  of  call  for  several  steamers  each  week,  there 


110  Naturalist  at  Large 

was  a  considerable  turnover  in  the  resident  population. 

It  was  the  general  practice  of  all  local  leaders  to  have 
a  man's  total  wages  for  a  coming  trip  completely- 
swallowed  in  trade  before  that  individual  ever  em- 
barked. This  practice  definitely  assured  the  men  that 
they  would  earn  nothing  if  they  depended  solely  on 
the  rewards  of  honest  labor.  Thievery  of  cargo  in 
vessels'  holds  and,  for  the  more  daring,  from  ware- 
houses in  southern  ports,  led  each  individual  to  a  com- 
mon understanding  that  the  only  way  a  man  could 
possibly  profit  was  by  dishonest  means.  The  resultant 
situation  on  Inagua  was  that  of  men  vying  with  one 
another  to  show  their  prowess  at  various  forms  of 
gangster  technique.  This  was  evidenced  in  a  blatant, 
bawdy  sort  of  life  in  which  Saturday-night  wife  beat- 
ings, drunkenness  and  various  rather  futile  attempts  at 
knifing  were  the  common  order  of  the  day. 

It  was  a  particularly  unsatisfactory  situation  in  that 
no  one  valued  money  as  such,  and  no  one  seemed  able 
to  conceive  how  they  might  be  benefited  by  what  we 
think  of  as  a  higher  standard  of  living.  A  standard  of 
living  to  them  was  nothing  more  than  an  abysmal  pov- 
erty which  had  its  one  soul-satisfying  outlet  in  boast- 
fulness  of  how  tough  one  could  be.  No  one  was  anxious 
to  earn  money  in  excess  of  that  required  to  fulfill  the 
most  meager  purchases  of  food  and  clothing;  all  the 
so-called  luxuries  such  as  cheap  rayons,  silks  and 
gaudy  wearing  apparel  having  been  acquired  through 
the  aforementioned  pilfering.  No  one  dreamed  of  hav- 
ing money  in  terms  which  could  possibly  mean  a  decent 
house  to  live  in  and,  for  that  matter,  even  a  decent 


The  Bahamas^  Old  and  New  111 

bed  to  sleep  in.  No  one  thought  of  money  in  terms 
of  food  other  than  rice  and  grits.  No  one  thought  of 
children's  schooling  as  a  large  percentage  of  the  pop- 
ulation was  illiterate. 

If  you  paid  a  man  the  miserable  daily  wage  of  50 
cents,  he  would  probably  work  six  days  out  of  the 
seven.  If  you  were  sufficiently  insane  to  pay  him  $  i  .00 
a  day,  he  most  certainly  would  not  work  more  than 
three  days  per  week.  In  other  words,  there  was  no 
means  by  which  one  could  stimulate  a  desire  for  edu- 
cation, for  better  food,  for  better  housing  or  for  bet- 
ter anything.  Everyone  was  at  zero  level,  and  having 
always  been  there  were  perfectly  content  to  remain 
there.  I  could  only  think  of  the  story  which  one  of  my 
professors  at  Tech  used  to  tell  about  the  manager  of  a 
sawmill  in  Arkansas  who  was  faced  with  the  same 
problem  when  executives  of  his  company,  having  of- 
fices in  Chicago,  decided  that  wages  in  the  Arkansas 
mill  should  be  doubled.  The  result  was  a  halving  of 
production  as  it  is  simple  arithmetic  that  if  you  get 
twice  as  much  you  need  only  work  half  as  much  to 
get  the  same  net  result.  As  the  story  goes,  the  manager 
solved  his  difficulties  by  a  present  of  a  brilliant  red 
silk  dress  to  the  boss  Negro's  wife,  at  the  same  time 
supplying  a  stock  of  similar  dresses  priced  at  fabulous 
figures  to  the  commissariat.  Within  the  week  feminine 
desire  not  to  be  outdone  drove  reluctant  husbands  and 
aspiring  swains  to  a  full  sLx-day-per-week  schedule  of 
operation. 

It  was  an  example  that  was  difficult  for  us  to  put 
into  effect  in  Inagua  as  the  light  tinsely  trappings  that 


112  Naturalist  at  Large 

fulfilled  the  population's  desire  for  adornment  were 
all  to  be  had  in  ample  quantities  simply  at  the  risk  of 
a  little  daring.  To  turn  to  the  more  solid  things  of 
life  such  as  greater  creature  comfort  in  the  form  of 
homes,  etc.  was  so  remote  from  hope  of  attainment 
that  we  could  induce  no  individual  in  the  community 
to  as  much  as  attempt  to  struggle  for  same.  It  took  years 
of  carefully  planned  control  —  control  of  lawless  ac- 
tivities while  men  were  on  shipboard,  control  of  local 
commodity  buying  and  selling,  control  of  living  con- 
ditions, and  virtually  the  way  of  life  before  we  had  the 
final  satisfaction  of  seeing  personal  initiative,  the 
rudiments  of  self-respect,  and  something  closely  akin 
to  character  begin  to  develop  on  the  island. 

To  counteract  exorbitant  local  prices  for  food  and 
clothing,  we  found  ourselves  with  a  general  store  on 
our  hands,  we  bought  in  bulk  at  wholesale  prices  and 
resold  at  a  price  just  sufficient  to  defray  overhead. 
We  found  ourselves  running  a  restaurant  business,  a 
rudimentary  housing  project,  a  medical  clinic,  and 
many  similar  organizations,  all  of  which  slowly  and 
painstakingly  began  to  have  their  respective  influences 
on  the  wants  and  opinions  of  the  public. 

New  types  of  food  were  edged  in  at  the  store,  were 
sometimes  given  away  as  gifts  with  other  purchases, 
and  ever  so  slowly  new  tastes  were  cultivated  for 
nutritious,  healthful  foods  that  had  never  before  been 
tried  or  tolerated  on  the  island.  In  the  same  way  our 
restaurants  provided  meals  in  which  our  company 
absorbed  the  major  part  of  the  cost,  so  that  regard- 
less of  whether  some  of  the  dishes  served  were  new, 


The  Bahamas,  Old  and  New  113 

and  regardless  of  whether  they  were  particularly  liked 
at  first,  the  general  run  of  the  men  found  that  they 
got  so  much  for  so  little  that  they  could  ill  afford  to 
provide  their  own  wretched  type  of  meal  for  which 
they  had  a  natural  liking  in  place  of  the  more  prop- 
erly balanced  meals  which  were  somewhat  strange 
and  under  normal  conditions  would  be  unacceptable 
to  the  uninitiated  palate.  Through  better  feeding  our 
men  have  found  that  they  are  less  prone  to  sickness, 
that  they  are  less  susceptible  to  cold,  and  that  they 
have  a  greater  abundance  of  vitality  than  ever  before. 

The  same  has  been  true  of  our  attempts  at  proper 
housing,  of  our  attempt  at  maintaining  a  proper  clinic, 
where  it  is  now  quite  plainly  evident  that  the  benefits 
received  are  worth  while,  that  they  lead  to  actual 
greater  enjoyment  of  life,  and  we  have  in  the  making 
a  tentative  acceptance  of  the  fact  that  a  higher  standard 
of  living  is  something  worth  striving  for,  that  al- 
though to  be  industrious  requires  a  considerable  ex- 
penditure of  personal  effort,  the  returns  from  such 
industry  begin  to  lead  toward  something  approxi- 
mating home  life,  toward  an  atmosphere  less  laden 
with  the  wretched  squalor  and  misery  that  was  so  gen- 
erally accepted  as  being  the  only  form  of  life  ob- 
tainable. 

Concurrently  with  this  slow  awakening  of  interest 
we  have  carried  on  an  educational  program  which 
had  its  foundation  in  our  garage  and  maintenance  shops 
where  our  youngest  and,  per  se,  most  intelligent  labor 
material  was  started  in  chipping  rust,  cleaning  machine 
parts  and  finally,  though  slowly,  learned  not  only  the 


114  Naturalist  at  Large 

visual  aspect  of  the  inside  of  a  piece  of  machinery  but 
also  learned  something  about  the  value  of  caring  for 
that  equipment.  From  this  stage  they  were  carried  to 
that  of  learning  to  drive  trucks,  run  pumps,  operate 
power  shovels,  drive  tractors  —  in  short,  carry  on 
practically  all  the  mechanical  operation  of  our  plant's 
equipment,  and  that,  too,  with  a  considerable  degree  of 
skiU  and  success. 

Imperceptibly  this  group  of  men  and  boys  were  the 
forerunners  of  an  upper  class  in  the  island's  native 
society,  a  class  which  had  heretofore  known  no  marks 
of  distinction,  no  gradation  of  education,  no  differ- 
ential as  to  degrees  of  ability,  all  because  the  class 
as  a  whole  were  what  was  locally  known  in  Nassau  as 
being  behind  God's  back.  This  awakening  of  class 
consciousness  has  been  a  stabiHzing  influence  for  the 
community  as  a  whole.  Just  as  the  first  group  of  truck 
drivers  were  looked  upon  by  all  and  sundry  as  being 
people  quite  specially  favored  and  quite  admirable  to 
emulate,  so  also  have  been  the  actions  of  this  upper 
class  of  society.  It  is  seen  that  they  have  better  homes, 
homes  which  are  tangible  and  possible  of  attainment. 
It  is  seen  that  some  of  this  group  are  acting  even  now 
to  get  a  better  education.  It  is  seen  that  this  group  as 
a  whole  are  being  invested  with  local  authority  and  as 
such,  shall  we  say,  perhaps  like  the  bureaucratic  regime 
in  Russia,  it  is  a  position  worth  striving  for.  Not  only 
is  the  financial  recompense  appreciable,  but  so  also 
is  the  standing  which  this  group  has  in  managing  local 
affairs. 

Our  whole  purpose  in  handling  this  group  of  Ne- 


The  Bahamas,  Old  and  New  115 

groes  as  we  have  has  been  in  an  attempt  to  place  them 
in  a  position  where  they  will  of  their  own  volition 
develop  themselves  and  make  of  themselves  some- 
thing more  than  goods  and  chattels,  which  are  the  per- 
petual care  of  government.  I  remember  an  old  sea  cap- 
tain who  in  his  training  of  a  young  lieutenant  said: 
"Hunt  him  until  he  hunts  himself  and  then  ye'll  no 
stop  him."  It  is  in  this  same  sense  that  we  have  tried 
to  drive,  to  push,  to  exert  until  such  a  point  is  reached 
that  this  group  of  fellows  with  whom  we  are  dealing 
will  take  this  momentum  and  carry  it  to  greater  speeds 
for  themselves. 

I  can  truthfully  say  that  the  Inagua  group  as  a  whole 
have  begun  to  repay  us  for  our  efforts.  The  younger 
members  in  particular  have  developed  some  mighty 
fine  characteristics.  There  is  an  esprit  de  corps  which, 
I  am  sorry  to  say,  I  have  not  found  equaled  in  any 
labor  group  with  which  I  have  had  dealings  in  the 
U.S.  There  has  been  a  conscientious  effort  on  their 
part  to  enter  into  discussions  on  company  affairs  and, 
what  is  most  gratifying,  there  is  the  general  feehng 
that  this  is  their  company.  If  you  as  a  stranger  talked 
to  one  of  our  truck  drivers  or,  for  that  matter,  to  any 
one  of  our  employees,  you  would  probably  be  told 
that  we  do  thus  or  that  we  do  so,  simply  because  al- 
most every  individual  now  begins  to  feel  that  he 
himself  is  in  some  way  responsible  for  the  develop- 
ments of  this  concern. 

Within  the  year  we  have  assisted  our  men  in  their 
formation  of  a  labor  union  which  it  is  hoped  will  have 
Sir  Ernest  Bevin's  recognition.  This  is  a  long  step 


116  Naturalist  at  Large 

to  have  taken  in  seven  years  from  a  time  when  local, 
self-seeking  interests  tried  to  drive  us  from  the  island 
by  killing  one  of  our  men  and  wounding  others.  It's  a 
long  step  to  have  taken  in  local  mental  outlook  when 
you  stop  to  consider  that  the  newly  formed  labor 
union  of  their  own  volition  took  the  name  of  "Asso- 
ciation" instead  of  "Union,"  as  to  their  minds  the 
word  "Union"  symbolized  a  condition  of  strife  and 
ill  feeling  between  employer  and  employee  and  in  this 
case  it  was  their  special  wish  that  no  such  connotation 
should  exist  but  rather  that  we  should  always  feel  that 
everything  done  by  our  concern  should  be  an  expres- 
sion of  extreme  and  loyal  co-operation  between  em- 
ployer and  employee. 

From  the  Inagua  which  you  knew  during  your  last 
visit  I  think  you  would  find  it  strange  to  see  a  condition 
wherein  a  company  labor  union  maintains  its  own 
clubhouse,  has  interest  enough  to  desire  educational 
features  such  as  lectures,  displays  of  laboratory  ex- 
periments, health  talks  and,  in  short,  practically  every- 
thing pertaining  to  that  higher  standard  of  living 
which  was  such  a  far  cry  when  we  first  landed  on  the 
island. 

Of  equal  interest  to  this  development  of  an  erst- 
while uneducated,  totally  forgotten  group  of  people 
is  the  development  of  the  natural  resources  of  the 
island  which  not  only  made  the  foregoing  possible 
but  also,  what  is  more,  practical.  Originally  the  island 
produced  a  fairly  large  quantity  of  salt  by  means  of 
solar  evaporation.  This  commodity  w^as  shipped  al- 
most exclusively  to  the  Eastern  Seaboard  of  the  United 


The  Bahamas,  Old  and  New  117 

States  and  Canada.  With  the  development  of  the 
salt  mines  in  New  York  State  the  price  of  salt  fell 
from  about  $30  a  ton  to  a  figure  little  more  than  $5.00. 
With  this  decline  in  price  little  effort  was  made  to 
alter  manufacturing  methods  sufficiently  to  keep  the 
then  existent  companies  solvent.  Each  followed  the 
other  in  a  succession  of  bankruptcies  until  the  in- 
dustry was  totally  at  an  end.  In  our  own  case  we 
have  been  fortunate  enough  with  certain  new  develop- 
ments to  make  the  manufacture  of  solar  salt  a  success- 
ful undertaking.  The  salt  now  being  produced  at 
Inagua  is  of  extreme  high  purity  and  for  the  most  part 
all  that  is  shipped  from  the  island  is  of  C.P.  grade. 
In  other  words,  our  main  attempt  has  been  to  get 
away  from  the  old  methods  of  solar  salt  manufacture 
which  almost  invariably  precluded  bulk  shipments  of 
a  chemically  pure  product  and  in  many  cases  went  far 
in  straining  the  fair  limits  of  Technical  Grade. 

What  was  known  on  old  maps  as  Lake  Rosa,  a 
desolate  mud  flat  of  a  lake  which  was  the  breeding 
ground  of  a  dying  flock  of  flamingos,  has  with  its 
new  name  of  Lake  Windsor  become  the  chief  object 
of  company  development.  Vast  quantities  of  sea  water 
are  being  pumped  into  this  lake.  Salt  pans  are  now 
being  built  on  what  was  known  as  the  Savannah, 
roaming  ground  of  countless  donkeys,  the  progenitors 
of  which  were  brought  from  Spain  by  Mr.  Matthew 
Clark  of  London.  Oddly  enough,  these  donkeys  were 
to  be  raised  for  use  primarily  in  the  salt  mines  in 
New  York  State. 

To  facilitate  the  operation  of  this  new  salt  area,  as 


118  Naturalist  at  Large 

well  as  a  magnesite  plant  which  is  part  of  the  new  de- 
velopment, we  have  built  a  road  from  Matthewtown 
to  Northwest  Point.  This  road  follows  the  shore  up 
to  Devil's  Point  where  it  cuts  across  and  again  touches 
the  sea  along  the  inner  edge  of  Man  o'  War  Bay. 
With  the  building  of  this  road  we  have  also  com- 
pleted a  continuous  stretch  of  dikes  which  join  all 
the  caps  on  the  western  side  of  Lake  Windsor.  On 
your  next  visit  to  our  island  I  am  sure  you  will  find 
these  embankments  excellent  vantage  points  from 
which  to  view  the  tremendous  quantity  of  wild  fowl 
which  the  lake  now  supports.  The  new  salt  water 
entering  the  area  has  provided  the  lake  with  a  teem- 
ing supply  of  fish  and  small  Crustacea  which  should 
greatly  increase  our  even  now  sizable  flocks  of  white 
heron,  egrets,  ducks  and  flamingos. 

I  hope  this  will  give  you  some  idea  of  the  changes 
which  have  been  taking  place  at  Inagua  in  the  last 

few  years.  ^        •         , 

■'  Ever  smcerely, 

Jim 

This  letter  of  Jim's  is  a  monument  of  understatement. 
He  has  built  up  an  enterprise  unique  in  all  the  British  West 
Indies.  Built  it  up  in  the  face  of  governmental  apathy  and 
of  native  ignorance  that  are  almost  unbelievable.  Fortu- 
nately the  Duke  of  Windsor  gives  him  sympathetic  and 
most  intelligent  consideration.  The  Ericksons  and  their 
families,  who  are  with  them,  may  indeed  be  proud  of  having 
revolutionized  a  community,  revived  an  industry,  built  it 
to  do  a  greater  and  better  work  than  was  ever  conceived 
of  when  the  industry  began. 


CHAPTER  X 


Reptiles  in  the  West  Indies 


M, 


.ANY  years  ago  I  acquired  a  strong  impression  that 
the  number  of  species  of  reptiles  and  amphibians  on  the 
Greater  Antilles  was  distinctly  limited,  and  for  years  I  made 
the  serious  mistake  of  interpreting  as  indvidual  variants,  or 
different  sexes,  adults  and  young  specimens  which  in  re- 
aHty  have  proved  to  be  totally  distinct  species.  A  great 
deal  of  the  proof  concerning  the  true  state  of  affairs  is  due 
to  a  former  student  of  mine  of  whom  I  am  inordinately 
proud.  Professor  Emmett  Reid  Dunn  of  Haverford  Col- 
lege. But  years  ago  in  Cuba  my  friend  Dr.  Charles  T. 
Ramsden  tried  to  set  me  right.  He  insisted  that  I  was  not 
recognizing  a  sufficient  number  of  frogs  of  a  certain  genus 
when  we  were  preparing  to  write  a  book  together  on  the 
reptiles  and  amphibians  of  Cuba.^ 

I  began  to  err  in  this  way  most  conspicuously  on  our 
first  trip  to  Jamaica  in  1909.  We  went  there  after  a  rather 
long  stay  in  the  Canal  Zone.  We  had  been  seeing  a  lot  of 
the  Gorgas  family  — the  Colonel,  as  he  was  then,  Mrs. 
Gorgas,  and  Aileen.  We  had  all  been  to  Chile  together 
and  when  I  came  back  to  work  in  the  Board  of  Health 
Laboratory  at  the  Canal  Zone,   the   General  and   Mrs. 

^I  know  that  I  was  unconsciously  influenced  by  what 
Gunther  and  Boulenger  had  written  when  Garman  multiplied 
the  species  of  Lesser  Antillean  lizards.  Time  proved  that  Garman 
was  entirely  correct. 


120  Naturalist  at  Large 

Gorgas  were  hospitable  beyond  measure.  When  we  went 
to  Jamaica  they  passed  us  on  to  friends  there,  the  Lagardes. 
I  wrote  my  first  paper  which  ever  really  amounted  to 
anything  as  a  result  of  the  material  we  got  in  Jamaica. 
This  paper  would  have  been  better  had  I  known  as  much 
as  I  know  now  about  the  limitations  of  individual  variation 
in  amphibians,  but  even  so,  we  spotted  some  good  things 
and  described  them. 

Most  of  these  we  got  at  Mandeville,  a  heavenly  spot  in 
the  hills  of  west  central  Jamaica,  where  the  Lagardes  had 
a  lovely  house  and  where  it  was  a  delight  to  be  alive  and 
one  keenly  regretted  the  passing  of  each  hour.  The  damp 
winds  blowing  over  the  hills  in  Jamaica  cause  a  lot  of 
rain  and  the  growth  of  what  are  called  "wild  pines"  is 
often  extensive.  These  are  what  in  our  South  are  called 
"air  plants,"  only  more  luxuriant  and  more  abundant  in 
species  than  the  bromeliads  of  Florida.  In  the  cup  formed 
by  the  long  recurving  leaves  of  each  individual  wild  pine 
plant  is  usually  a  half  pint  or  so  of  water,  and  these 
epiphytes  support  a  characteristic  and  extremely  interest- 
ing fauna. 

Our  method  was  to  spread  a  sheet  on  the  ground,  send 
up  a  Negro  boy  into  the  trees  to  throw  down  masses  of 
the  wild  pines,  and  shake  them  vigorously  over  the  sheet. 
All  hands  stood  by,  for  Lewis  and  Mary  Bremer  were  with 
us  at  this  time,  and  Mary  Clark  as  well.  They  helped  catch 
the  frogs  before  they  escaped,  and  picked  up  such  insects 
as  did  not  appear  too  noisome.  The  venomous-looking 
critters  were  left  to  me  and  my  metal  forceps. 

We  had  an  amusing  experience  in  Jamaica.  When  I  was 
a  sophomore  in  college  I  had  visited  my  cousin  Robert  S. 


Reptiles  in  the  West  Indies  111 

Johnstone,  who  was  a  judge  at  Nassau  in  the  Bahamas.  I 
knew  that  he  had  been  transferred  but  did  not  know  where 
he  had  gone.  Years  passed.  Then  at  dinner  one  evening  at 
the  Gorgases',  Sir  Claude  Mallet,  the  British  Minister  to 
Panama,  mentioned  Mr.  Johnstone  as  being  Colonial  Secre- 
tary in  Jamaica.  I  assumed  instantly  that  this  was  my 
transferred  cousin,  little  knowing  that  the  latter  had  been 
knighted  and  sent  to  the  Windward  Islands  to  be  Chief 
Justice.  When  we  left  Colon  to  cross  to  Kingston,  I  sent  a 
cable  to  the  Colonial  Secretary  saying,  "Meet  steamship 
Trent  arriving  such  and  such  a  date,"  and  thought  no  more 
of  the  matter.  When  we  got  to  Kingston  I  looked  about  for 
a  familiar  face,  but  in  vain.  Several  hours  were  consumed 
while  we  searched  for  the  Secretary  and  he  for  us.  The 
next  day  I  called  at  the  Colonial  Secretary's  office.  After 
being  ushered  into  the  presence,  for  in  British  colonies 
the  Colonial  Secretary  ranks  next  to  the  Governor,  I  found 
an  irritated  and  rather  awesome  personage.  I  gave  him  a 
long  explanation.  He  finally  got  a  Colonial  Office  List, 
looked  up,  smiled  broadly,  and  admitted  that  there  was 
another  person  whose  name  was  exactly  the  same  as  his 
own,  even  to  the  rather  unusual  spelling.  Moreover,  the 
fact  that  my  cousin  had  been  knighted  showed  that  he  was 
a  person  of  repute.  Mr.  Johnstone  asked  us  to  his  house 
and  a  most  pleasant  acquaintanceship  ensued. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  animals  in  the  world  to 
zoologists  is  that  creature  called  Peripatus.  I  use  this  name 
in  a  very  inclusive  way,  for  there  are  a  lot  of  genera  and 
species  scattered  over  the  world,  all  more  or  less  closely 
related  and  all  forming  together  a  group  of  the  utmost 


122  Naturalist  at  Large 

scientific  interest.  These  creatures  are  wormlike  in  many 
respects,  but  with  the  breathing  apparatus  of  insects  and 
with  the  power  of  ejecting  two  jets  of  viscous  and  irritating 
slime  from  pores  in  the  head  when  they  are  disturbed. 
Today  they  are  well  known  and  well  represented  in  col- 
lections. This  was  not  the  case  when  first  we  visited 
Jamaica,  but  we  knew  that  two  species  were  known  to 
occur  on  the  island  and  were  supposed  to  be  extremely 
rare.  We  had  almost  nothing  representing  this  pecuHar 
group  of  animals  in  the  museum  in  Cambridge  and  one  of 
the  special  reasons  for  going  to  Jamaica  was  to  get  Peri- 
patus.  Dr.  Michael  Grabham  was  a  distinguished  physician 
in  Kingston  and  an  excellent  amateur  entomologist.  I  knew 
that  he  had  collected  a  few  specimens  and  went  to  him  for 
information  as  to  where  they  might  be  found.  He  advised 
going  to  Bath,  where  there  was  an  old  mineral  spring  and 
hotel  of  sorts.  He  said  that  Perips,  as  we  call  them,  oc- 
curred only,  so  far  as  he  knew,  on  the  summit  of  Beacon 
Hill,  a  peak  in  the  Blue  Mountains  to  the  top  of  which 
there  was  a  path  leading  up  from  near  the  Bath  Springs 
House. 

Journeying  in  Jamaica  in  those  days  was  a  pleasant  con- 
trast to  what  it  is  now.  We  got  a  team  of  mules  and  a  big 
three-seated  canopy  top  at  Port  Antonio  and  drove  leisurely 
along  the  narrow  road  to  our  destination  at  the  east  end 
of  the  island.  The  scenery  was  superb  and  the  method  of 
traveling  permitted  the  most  complete  enjoyment  of  it. 
We  reached  Bath  after  a  long  day's  drive,  got  ourselves 
settled  and,  fortunately,  found  exactly  the  right  boy  for 
a  guide.  During  the  ensuing  days  we  made  daily  trips, 
Bremer  and  I,  to  the  summit  of  Beacon  Hill,  where  we 


Reptiles  in  the  West  Indies  123 

scratched  around  in  the  banana  trash  and  the  holes  in  the 
ground  out  of  which  one  could  pull  the  rotten  stumps  of 
plants  from  which  the  bananas  had  been  cut.  By  great  good 
fortune  we  came  up  with  a  really  wonderful  series  of  the 
animals,  whose  peculiarities  are  not  discoverable  to  the 
naked  eye.  They  look  like  velvety  brown  caterpillars  about 
two  inches  long.  We  killed  them  in  hot  water,  which  ex- 
panded and  relaxed  them,  and  preserved  them  for  perma- 
nent study  in  various  ways  — a  fine  collection.  We  were 
well  satisfied  and  returned  to  Port  Antonio.  There  I  as- 
siduously collected  an  enormous  series  of  sea  urchins  of 
the  genus  Cidaris,  which  Professor  R.  T.  Jackson,  my  old 
freshman  adviser,  wanted  for  statistical  study.  As  I  re- 
member it,  we  then  spent  several  weeks  at  Port  Antonio, 
awaiting  a  boat  to  Santiago,  Cuba. 

Several  days  before  sailing  Ros  said  to  me,  "I  have  a 
funny  lump  under  my  toe."  I  said,  "Let's  see  it."  The  skin 
was  tight  and  shiny  over  something  which  looked  as  if  an 
acorn  had  been  pushed  under  it.  Without  saying  what  I 
was  going  to  do,  I  gave  the  thing  a  pinch  and  out  popped 
a  mass  of  little  white  animals  that  looked  like  chestnut 
worms,  and  which  Ros  declared  had  black  eyes  that  ac- 
tually bhnked.  Without  discussing  the  zoological  improba- 
bilities involved,  I  washed  the  cavity  where  they  had  de- 
veloped with  formahn,  which  caused  her  acute  discomfort 
but  cured  matters  at  once.  I  found  out  that  while  I  had 
been  absent  on  Beacon  Hill  the  young  ladies  had  wandered 
up  the  valley  of  a  lovely  brook,  being  extremely  bored 
sitting  about  Bath,  and  having  found  a  shady  pool  far  up 
in  the  woods  they  proceeded  to  spend  their  days  dallying 
about  and  swimming  171  puris  Jiaturalibus.  And  of  course, 


124  Naturalist  at  Large 

while  they  were  sitting  about  on  the  sand,  a  chigoe,  or 
nigua,  as  they  are  called  in  Spanish,  had  crawled  in  through 
the  skin  under  Rosamond's  toe  and  proceeded  to  raise  a 
brood. 

As  is  my  usual  custom,  I  read  the  account  of  this  episode 
to  my  wife  last  evening.  This  is  worth-while  insurance. 
She  listened  to  me  and  then  snapped  out,  "I  think  it's  per- 
fectly disgusting  to  write  about  such  things.  And  anyway, 
it  wasn't  you;  it  was  Lewis  Bremer  who  poked  those  worms 
out  with  a  nail  cleaner."  I  shudder  when  I  wonder  what 
my  dear  old  friend  will  say  when  he  reads  this,  for  he  is  a 
genuine  doctor,  and  of  course  this  was  not  first-class  sur- 
gical practice. 

I  have  been  back  to  Jamaica  a  number  of  times  since 
this  visit,  once  or  twice  on  the  Utoivana  and  twice  or  more 
on  steamers  of  the  United  Fruit  Company.  I  was  usually 
inveigled  into  a  stopover  to  visit  another  very  old  friend, 
the  late  Mr.  Frank  Cundall,  a  real  antiquarian  and  a  capital 
historian.  Once  I  returned  to  Bath  with  Frank  Cundall  and 
David  Fairchild  and  we  found  still  standing  a  mango  and 
a  giant  Barringtonia  tree,  which  were  the  actual  individuals 
brought  back  by  Captain  Bligh  on  his  final  and  successful 
voyage  for  plant  introduction.  They  had  been  planted 
when  there  was  a  botanical  garden  at  Bath,  Although  he 
left  some  of  his  introductions  in  the  garden  at  St.  Vincent, 
I  could  not  find  any  evidence  that  any  of  Bligh's  trees  were 
still  alive  when  I  was  there  several  years  ago.  But  there  are 
two  or  tTiree  unquestioned  survivors  in  Jamaica. 

I  have  made  so  many  journeys  among  the  West  Indies  — 
fifteen  or  twenty  —  that  I  have  trouble  keeping  them  sepa- 


Reptiles  in  the  West  Indies  125 

rate  In  my  mind.  One  of  the  pleasantest  of  them,  however, 
came  as  a  distinct  surprise,  and  I  am  sure  that  my  dehght 
when  I  heard  that  AlHson  Armour  planned  to  take  the 
Utowmia  on  a  long  cruise  through  the  West  Indies  may 
be  well  understood.  There  were  many  islands  which  I  had 
never  visited,  although  I  had  studied  collections  made  on 
almost  all  of  them  and  I  had  a  great  desire  to  see  those 
localities  even  for  a  short  time. 

This  cruise  was  undertaken  primarily  to  secure  con- 
fidential information  for  one  of  the  government  depart- 
ments in  Washington,  and  I  had  a  long  list  of  seeds  which 
the  Office  of  Plant  Introduction  wanted  me  to  secure  in 
the  Lesser  Antilles  for  introduction  into  Florida.  The 
zoological  collections  of  vertebrate  animals  from  the  West 
Indies  in  the  Museum  at  Cambridge  are  so  complete  that 
there  was  no  object  in  collecting  on  a  wholesale  scale,  but 
there  were  special  things  here  and  there  that  I  wanted 
very  much. 

Actually  more  good  accrued  to  the  Museum  than  might 
have  been  reasonably  expected.  I  will  cite  one  or  two 
conspicuous  examples.  For  instance,  we  reached  Pointe  a 
Pitre  in  Guadeloupe  not  long  after  a  devastating  hurricane. 
The  little  local  Natural  History  Museum  in  this  town  was 
long  ago  named  for  old  I'Herminier,  a  French  naturalist 
who  first  made  known  the  fauna  of  this  very  interesting 
island  and  its  dependencies.  The  roof  of  the  museum  had 
been  blown  off  and  his  collection  of  birds  left  in  pitiful 
condition.  They  had  been  removed  from  their  cases  and 
stood  about  the  floor  in  the  hope  that  they  would  dry 
out  after  the  tempestuous  rain  which  had  fallen  upon  them. 
It  took  but  a  glance  to  see  that  I'Herminier's  two  specimens 


126  Naturalist  at  Large 

of  the  rare  black-capped  petrel  were  beyond  saving.  On 
the  other  hand  four  specimens  of  the  local  burrowing  owl 
were  in  very  fair  condition.  I  arranged  to  make  a  substantial 
contribution  to  repairing  the  roof  and  took  two  of  the 
burrowing  owls.  Our  Museum  had  one  already  and  with 
one  of  this  pair  I  made  an  advantageous  exchange  with 
Lord  Rothschild,  which  still  left  us  with  a  pair.  The  bird  is 
long  since  extinct. 

A  few  days  later  a  visit  to  the  Island  of  Marie  Galante 
made  it  quite  evident  that  this  little  owl  really  had  been 
confined  there,  never  occurring  on  Guadeloupe.  Marie 
Galante  is  low,  flat  and  sandy,  typical  burrowing-owl 
country.  Guadeloupe  is  high,  mountainous,  and  heavily 
forested.  It  is  a  pity  that  the  bird  was  named  Speotyto 
giiadeloupensis  —  one  of  the  myriad  unfortunate  zoologic 
names  which  are  misleading  but  which  have  to  remain  in 
use  if  we  are  to  have  any  stability  of  nomenclature  at  all. 

Incidentally  I  had  a  chance  to  see  alive  on  Marie  Galante, 
and  indeed  to  collect,  a  series  of  the  most  magnificent  of 
all  the  tree  lizards  — the  genus  Anolis.  This  Garman  col- 
lected and  described  from  this  island  when  he  visited 
there  with  Mr.  Agassiz  on  board  the  Blake,  over  half  a 
century  ago.  No  one  since  had  collected  reptiles  here  and 
this  was  fine  exchange  material.  It  is  strange  that  so  many 
of  these  httle  islands  which  at  first  sight  appeared  to  be 
but  recently  separated  from  their  larger  neighbors  should 
support  so  many  extraordinarily  distinct  Hzards.  The  Anolis 
of  Marie  Galante  is  a  truly  beautiful  lizard,  and  if  there 
were  not  other  species  which  more  or  less  intergrade  with 
the  general  run  of  the  species  in  this  enormous  genus,  it 
might  be  set  forth  itself  as  being  genetically  distinct. 


Reptiles  in  the  West  Indies  127 

A  visit  to  Dominica  brought  a  chance  to  meet  Mr. 
Joseph  Jones,  long  the  curator  of  the  lovely  botanic  gar- 
den, and  this  meeting  engendered  a  pleasant  correspond- 
ence which  lasted  for  years.  On  our  visit  to  Grenada,  I 
fell  in  with  Father  Gates,  a  descendant  of  General  Gates 
of  Boston  Revolutionary  fame,  a  naturalist  and  an  artist 
of  great  talent.  When  he  died  years  later  I  received  a  large 
album  full  of  colored  drawings  of  insects,  plants,  and 
other  creatures,  all  of  exquisite  beauty,  with  a  card  saying 
**Sent  at  the  request  of  the  Rev.  Sebastian  Gates,  O.P." 
I  was  touched  by  his  thinking  of  me  in  this  way  although  I 
knew  I  had  made  him  very  happy  by  fencing  his  little 
house  and  chapel  at  Piedmontaine  to  keep  stray  goats  out 
of  his  garden.  These  exquisite  sketches  may  easily  serve  to 
illustrate  future  publications  of  the  Museum  describing 
material  from  this  enchanting  isle. 

Our  visit  to  Port-of-Spain,  Trinidad,  was  a  great  event, 
for  I  met  then  for  the  first  time  Fred  Urich,  with  whom  I 
had  corresponded  for  years.  Someone  had  just  brought 
him  a  living  tiny  frog  of  the  genus  Amphodus,  hitherto 
unknown  from  Trinidad,  a  lovely  little  golden-yellow 
creature,  tiny  but  with  eyes  like  jewels.  This  is  found  in 
bromeHaceous  plants  in  the  highest  lands  of  the  island,  and 
he  generously  gave  it  to  me  to  take  back  to  Cambridge. 
He  was  always  doing  things  of  this  sort.  I  visited  him 
again  several  years  later  in  his  home  outside  Port-of-Spain, 
and  was  saddened  later  on  when  the  news  came  of  his 
death. 

Herbert  Stabler,  an  old  friend,  was  living  in  Caracas, 
the  representative  of  the  Mellon  oil  interests.  He  asked  me 
to  stay  at  his  house  while  some  minor  repairs  were  being 


128  Naturalist  at  Large 

made  to  the  Utoivana  at  La  Guaira.  His  wife  and  sons 
were  in  the  States  and  we  were  quite  foot-free.  Allison  felt 
that  he  should  stay  on  board  the  boat,  only  coming  up  to 
the  capital  from  time  to  time  for  the  day.  Finally  Allison 
set  a  certain  day  and  suggested  that  we  meet  him  in  Puerto 
Cabello.  From  my  point  of  view  this  arrangement  was 
perfect,  for  it  made  possible  a  motor  trip  from  Caracas  to 
the  port  with  visits  to  Maracay  and  Lake  Valencia  en 
route. 

Maracay  is  one  of  the  unique  cities  of  the  world.  There 
is  a  great  ready-made  stronghold  with  a  sumptuous  hotel 
and  beautiful  buildings,  all  because  the  famous  dictator 
General  Juan  Vicente  Gomez  disliked  the  climate  of 
Caracas.  Here  he  had  his  model  farm  and  his  extraordinary 
zoological  garden.  This  was  in  charge  of  one  of  the 
younger  members  of  the  well-known  Hagenbeck  family 
of  Hamburg,  who  by  chance  knew  who  I  was.  Herbert 
Stabler  naturally  knew  Gomez  well  and  at  this  particular 
time  was  teaching  some  of  the  old  General's  boys  to  play 
polo.  I  don't  think  to  the  day  he  died  that  Herbert  even 
dreamed  what  an  unbeHevable  beast  the  General  really 
was. 

At  last  it  was  arranged  that  I  should  meet  the  old  tyrant 
and  see  his  zoo.  At  the  hour  appointed  we  drove  out  to  his 
farm  some  miles  from  the  city  and  waited  near  the  um- 
brageous rain  tree  under  which  he  held  his  audiences.  Be- 
fore long  a  host  of  his  Andino  cowboys,  armed  to  the 
teeth,  rode  up  in  a  cloud  of  dust  and  in  the  middle  of  the 
great  straggling  group  rode  the  General  on  a  beautiful 
horse.  He  held  a  large  umbrella  over  his  head  and  car- 
ried a  little  grandchild  in  front  of  him  in  the  saddle.  The 


Reptiles  in  the  West  Indies  129 

cowboys  all  took  up  places  on  fence  posts  hither  and  yon, 
for  Gomez  was  in  terror  of  assassination.  After  the  General 
had  spoken  to  several  other  people,  Dr.  Riquena,  his  per- 
sonal physician,  came  up  and  motioned  for  Herbert  and 
me  to  step  forward.  We  did.  The  General  shook  us  cor- 
dially by  the  hand,  his  own  being  encased  in  thin,  purplish 
silk  gloves.  It  was  said  that  he  wore  these  and  changed 
them  frequently  to  make  it  difficult  for  anyone  to  rub 
poison  on  his  fingers  which  he  might  afterwards  get  in 
his  mouth.  This  of  course  is  pure  hearsay;  nevertheless 
the  gloves  were  there.  When  he  found  that  I  could  speak 
Spanish,  he  began  asking  questions.  Before  long  Hagenbeck 
was  sent  for  and  he  and  I  started  to  make  a  tour  of  the 
zoo,  charged  to  return  later  on  and  report  to  the  General 
on  what  we  had  seen. 

The  zoo  was  something  which  I  shall  never  forget.  It 
was  utterly  unlike  any  other.  For  instance,  its  several  enor- 
mous specimens  of  hippopotamus  lived  in  a  pretty  little 
lake  in  a  vast  field  where  giraffes,  zebras,  and  a  host  of 
other  antelopes  wandered  about  quite  as  if  they  were  at 
home  and  in  country  similar  to  East  Africa  in  appearance. 
He  had  truly  an  extraordinary  collection.  A  few  specimens 
stood  out  particularly.  He  had  a  remarkable  lot  of  the  rare 
spectacled  bears  found  in  the  Andes  of  several  South  Amer- 
ican states  and  the  only  bear  south  of  Mexico.  His  paca- 
ranas,  which  look  like  nothing  but  overgrown  black  bea- 
vers with  stubby  tails,  were  his  most  priceless  zoological 
gems.  They  are  the  largest  of  the  strictly  terrestrial  ro- 
dents and  they  represent  the  monotypic  genus  Dinomys. 

While  we  were  looking  at  the  Dinomys  the  General 
walked  up.  Of  course  his  animals  were  not  labeled  and 


130  Naturalist  at  Large 

he  said  to  me,  "I  bet  you  don't  know  what  those  are." 
I  replied,  "My  General,  you  have  lost  your  bet,"  and 
proceeded  to  tell  him.  He  was  quite  amused.  But  it  was 
by  sheer  chance  that  I  happened  to  know,  for  to  this  day 
we  have  never  been  able  to  get  anything  more  than  a 
skull  to  represent  this  genus  in  the  Museum  in  Cambridge. 
The  animal  has  a  wide  distribution  but  seems  to  be  exces- 
sively rare  throughout  its  entire  range. 

We  at  length  drove  on  to  Lake  Valencia  which  I  wanted 
to  see  on  account  of  its  birds.  They  were  interesting,  but 
as  a  show  not  up  to  those  of  Florida.  We  finally  reached 
Puerto  Cabello,  that  famous  harbor  which  was  given  its 
name,  the  Port  of  the  Hair,  because  it  was  so  well  pro- 
tected that  a  ship  could  be  moored  with  a  thread.  We 
found  Allison  in  port  cruising  frantically  up  and  down  in 
the  yacht's  launch,  passing  back  and  forth  along  the  water- 
front holding  a  yellow  flag  in  his  hand.  He  had  been  in 
the  harbor  for  hours  and  in  spite  of  frantic  signalings  had 
been  unable  to  get  the  attention  of  any  officials  to  be  for- 
mally received. 

I  went  into  the  customhouse,  for  of  course  my  bag- 
gage had  to  be  passed  out  of  the  country  with  a  good  deal 
more  in  the  way  of  inspection  than  when  it  came  in.  The 
customs  officer  was  sitting  at  a  high  desk  writing  indus- 
triously in  a  ledger.  I  told  him  that  I  had  been  lunching 
with  the  General  at  Maracay  and  that  he  had  asked  Dr. 
Riquena  to  notify  the  port  officials  that  we  were  not  to 
be  interfered  with  in  any  way.  The  collector  of  the  port 
said  that  he  had  had  no  such  news.  I  was  too  old  a  hand 
to  be  much  surprised,  but  I  was  somewhat  incensed  when 


Reptiles  in  the  West  Indies  131 

he  said  that  he  doubted  the  luncheon  story.  I  said,  "Fine, 
but  I  should  hate  to  be  in  your  shoes,"  and  grabbed  at 
his  telephone.  This  called  his  bluff  completely,  and  bid- 
ding good-bye  to  my  host  I  seized  my  bags  and  threw  them 
into  Allison's  launch. 

I  waved  to  Stabler,  pushed  my  way  down  the  steps  of 
the  quay,  and  jumped  aboard.  On  the  quay  were  a  crowd 
of  the  most  pitiful-looking  convicts  I  have  ever  seen:  loaded 
with  chains,  they  were  being  taken  out  to  an  island  prison 
in  the  harbor.  After  Gomez's  death  the  prison  was  finally 
dismantled  and  abandoned,  the  frightful  terrors  there  hav- 
ing been  revealed  to  the  world.  We  went  quickly  out  to 
the  launch,  got  aboard,  hoisted  the  gangway,  and  started 
the  engines.  We  had  not  gone  far  when  there  was  a  good 
deal  of  sudden  activity  on  a  small  Venezuelan  man-of-war 
anchored  not  far  away.  She  whistled  frantically  but  ob- 
viously had  no  steam  in  her  boilers.  Fortunately  she  re- 
frained from  firing  on  us.  We  felt  distinctly  more  com- 
fortable, however,  after  we  had  turned  the  point  and  left 
the  mouth  of  the  harbor. 

A  visit  to  Cartagena  followed.  Then  came  the  Canal 
Zone  and  Barro  Colorado  Island,  where  more  repairs  to  a 
troublesome  engine  gave  me  needed  time  to  prepare  our 
annual  report.  After  this  visit  we  went  on  to  Cienfuegos 
Harbor.  I  disembarked  for  Soledad  and  thus  ended  a  mem- 
orable and  most  delightful  voyage. 


PART  II 

THE  SEDENTARY  NATURALIST 


CHAPTER  XI 

Naturalists  in  Dispute 


G, 


"ENERALLY  speaking,  the  naturalists  of  today  are  a 
friendly  clan  not  given  to  bickering  and  to  reviling  one 
another.  Two  generations  ago  they  were  quite  different. 
The  turmoil  which  followed  the  appearance  of  Darwin's 
Origin  of  Species  Is  familiar  to  many,  but  the  scientific 
feud  which  accompanied  the  opening  up  of  our  Western 
country  is  less  well  known.  When  the  fossil  fields  in  the 
badlands  of  the  West  were  accessible  to  exploration  and 
the  Army  had  the  Indians  more  or  less  under  control,  the 
rush  to  collect  and  describe  the  treasures  which  were  un- 
covered by  each  succeeding  rain  as  It  washed  down  the 
banks  of  ravines  makes  a  story  almost  unbehevable  today. 
The  principal  competitors  were  Professor  Othneil 
Charles  Marsh  of  Yale  and  Professor  Edward  Drinker 
Cope  of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania.  Marsh  had  wealth 
at  his  command,  was  an  honorary  member  of  forty-one 
scientific  academies  in  twelve  different  countries.  For  many 
years  he  was  President  of  the  National  Academy  of  Sci- 
ences and  used  the  power  of  this  office  to  keep  Professor 
Cope  from  being  elected.  Not  until  after  Marsh's  death 
was  Cope  admitted  to  the  Academy,  and  this  despite  the 
fact  that  he  belonged  to  one  of  the  most  distinguished 
Quaker  famihes  in  Philadelphia,  was  a  great  naturalist  and 
a  kinsman  of  all  the  various  and  sundry  Drinkers  whom 
we  admire  today. 


136  Naturalist  at  Large 

Both  these  men,  wealthy,  fashionable,  and  learned, 
stooped  to  any  depths  to  steal  a  march  on  one  another. 
Their  rivalry  was  so  bitter,  their  hatred  of  each  other  so 
intense,  that  to  us  the  feud  seems  almost  incredible. 

Cope  had  an  uncanny  visual  memory.  I  remember  Leon- 
hard  Stejneger,  late  Head  Curator  of  Biology  in  the  U.  S. 
National  Museum,  telling  me  that  Cope  stood  looking  over 
his  shoulder  at  a  curious  Uttle  lizard  which  the  old  collector, 
John  Xanthus,  had  sent  in  from  Lower  California.  Stejneger 
was  studying  this  Hzard  when  Cope  entered  the  room,  in- 
deed he  was  preparing  to  write  out  his  description,  for 
nothing  like  it  had  ever  been  known  before.  Cope  glanced 
at  the  specimen  for  a  few  moments,  put  on  his  coat,  walked 
to  the  telegraph  office,  and  wired  a  perfectly  accurate  de- 
scription of  the  beast  to  the  American  Naturalist,  thus  glee- 
fully stealing  the  credit  of  the  discovery  for  himself. 

In  addition  to  their  own  efforts,  both  Marsh  and  Cope 
employed  other  collectors  who  traveled  far  and  wide,  gath- 
ering fossils  and  ruthlessly  destroying"  material  which  they 
did  not  have  time  to  take  up  before  the  approach  of  winter 
so  that  no  rival  would  chance  to  find  it  subsequently. 

Samuel  Carman  was  a  protege  of  Alexander  Agassiz,  who 
was  also  sent  out  into  the  field.  On  one  trip  he  reached  Fort 
Laramie  just  as  Professor  Marsh  brought  in  a  collection 
which  was  to  be  shipped  east.  As  I  remember  it,  neither 
Marsh  nor  Garman  knew  that  Cope  was  in  town.  Since 
lodgings  were  scarce,  Garman  bunked  in  the  empty  station. 
Late  one  night,  after  he  had  turned  in,  he  heard  someone 
stealthily  enter  the  room.  The  intruder  made  a  careful 
examination  of  the  slatted  crates  containing  Marsh's  ma- 
terial. This  went  on  for  some  time,  then  at  last  the  figure 


Naturalists  in  Dispute  137 

departed  empty-handed.  In  the  morning  Marsh  arrived. 
Garman  described  what  had  happened  and  Marsh  said, 
"Oh,  I  foresaw  that  possibility.  That  was  Cope.  He  Ukes 
to  describe  from  skulls,  and  all  the  good  skulls  I  got  this 
season  are  in  the  stove."  Marsh  then  went  to  the  stove, 
opened  the  door,  extracted  a  bushel  or  so  of  treasures, 
wrapped  them,  boarded  the  train,  and  went  east  with  the 
cream  of  his  catch.  Marsh  didn't  dare  keep  them  in  his 
lodging,  but  put  them  for  safekeeping  in  a  place  where  he 
felt  sure  they  would  be  undisturbed  —  as  they  were. 

Garman  himself  was  an  extraordinary  character.  After 
such  training  it  was  no  wonder  he  was  secretive  about 
everything.  He  seldom  talked  about  himself,  but,  work- 
ing with  him  as  I  did  for  many  years,  I  picked  up  bits  of 
information  now  and  then.  He  had  run  away  from  home 
as  a  boy.  He  told  me  he  was  brought  up  as  a  Quaker.  I 
imagine  he  had  a  German  father  and  a  Quaker  mother,  for 
the  notes  in  all  the  volumes  of  his  library  acquired  during 
his  earliest  years  were  written  in  German  and  in  Gothic 
script.  Be  that  as  it  may,  he  drifted  west,  became  a  profes- 
sional hunter  for  a  construction  gang  on  the  Union  Pacific 
Railroad;  he  shot  buffalo  and,  he  told  me,  though  it  went 
against  his  Quaker  upbringing,  he  shot  Indians  too  on  more 
than  one  occasion. 

Reading  in  a  paper  that  Louis  Agassiz  was  to  land  in 
San  Francisco  at  the  close  of  the  voyage  of  the  Hassler, 
Garman  trekked  out  to  meet  him  and  was  on  the  wharf 
when  the  ship  pulled  in.  He  introduced  himself  and  told 
the  professor  of  his  interest  in  natural  history  and  of  his 
ambition  to  be  a  scientist.  Agassiz  brought  him  to  Cam- 
bridge where  he  remained  the  rest  of  his  life.  David  Starr 


138  Naturalist  at  Large 

Jordan  records  that  Garman  was  one  of  the  little  group 
who,  with  Professor  Agassiz,  with  their  own  hands  laid 
the  floor  of  the  barn  which  became  the  first  Marine  Bio- 
logical Laboratory  at  Penikese  Island  on  Buzzard's  Bay. 
Garman  kept  the  books  of  the  Laboratory.  His  costume 
was  singular:  at  first  he  wore  a  broad  "Western"  hat  and  a 
flaming  red  four-in-hand  necktie.  Later  on  he  dressed  in  a 
ciuriously  somber  and  semi-ecclesiastical  suit,  somewhat 
like  that  affected  by  the  late  David  Belasco. 

In  1873  Louis  Agassiz  died,  and  so  did  his  daughter-in- 
law,  Alexander's  lovely  young  bride.  Alexander  Agassiz 
was  a  distracted  man  and,  to  escape  his  grief,  he  set  sail 
to  make  a  hydrographical  survey  of  Lake  Titicaca  in  Peru. 
He  took  Garman  with  him  and  I  well  recall  Garman's  tales 
of  the  glories  of  the  Andes.  The  Agassiz  Museum  still  has 
the  skin  of  a  magnificent  condor  which  Garman  says  sailed 
by  him  as  he  was  perched  on  a  high  crag  overlooking  the 
lake.  The  bird  had  its  regular  beat  and  came  by  every  so 
often.  Garman's  shotgun  shells  were  loaded  with  fine  shot, 
for  he  was  collecting  small  birds.  Feeling  sure  that  the 
condor  would  be  back  before  long,  he  took  his  penknife, 
cut  his  suspender  buttons  off  and  pushed  them  into  the 
barrel  of  his  gun,  tamping  them  down  with  some  of  the 
paper  he  had  to  wrap  his  birds.  Before  long  the  great  con- 
dor swept  by  again  and  with  a  quick  aim  Garman  killed  it. 
This  was  his  last  adventure.  He  returned  to  Cambridge  and, 
so  far  as  I  know,  never  left  it  again. 

His  early  experiences  with  the  way  Cope  and  Marsh 
treated  one  another's  researches  evidently  soured  Garman, 
for  it  was  many  years  before  I  could  come  into  his  room 
without  his  spreading  sheets  of  newspaper  over  the  table 


Naturalists  in  Dispute  139 

where  he  worked.  He  made  beautiful  dissections,  and  be- 
came a  most  accompUshed  comparative  anatomist,  chiefly 
interested  in  the  sharks  and  skates  and  rays.  He  had  quar- 
ters in  the  basement  of  the  Museum  which  could  not  be 
reached  except  by  a  grilled  door.  One  rang  a  bell,  there 
was  a  rustle  of  papers  (the  shades  were  never  pulled  up, 
so  you  couldn't  look  in  the  windows) ;  after  a  while  Gar- 
man  came  to  the  door  and  opened  it,  the  grille  outside 
meantime  being  fastened.  After  he  had  verified  the  iden- 
tity of  his  visitor,  he  might  let  him  in  and  be  quite  friendly. 
Just  as  often  he  was  too  busy,  and  closed  the  door. 

I  worked  with  Garman  for  many  years  and  probably 
came  to  know  him  as  well  as  anyone.  I  little  realized  what 
an  oddity  he  really  was  until  after  his  death  when  I  found 
in  a  cupboard  in  his  room  a  jar  full  of  little  stickers  bearing 
his  name  and  address  which  he  had  cut  from  each  copy  of 
the  Nation.  Another  giant  glass  container  was  filled  with 
his  old  rubbers.  Whether  this  was  prophetic,  in  view  of 
our  present  shortage,  or  simply  the  pack-rat  instinct,  I 
leave  to  the  reader  to  guess.  Still  more  unsavory  was  an- 
other jar,  at  least  three  feet  high,  which  contained  bits  of 
bread,  the  uneaten  corners  of  the  sandwiches  which  Gar- 
man  had  brought  for  his  luncheons  for  years  and  years. 

You  see,  my  thesis  is  that  working  in  a  museum  used  to 
make  people  odd.  Of  course,  that's  not  the  case  of  my  col- 
leagues or  me.  As  one  of  my  daughters  said  of  us,  "You 
don't  have  to  be  crazy,  but  it  certainly  helps." 


CHAPTER  XII 

Three  Friends 


I 


CANNOT  remember  where  I  first  met  John  Phillips, 
but  I  became  his  devoted  slave  and  admirer  from  the  very- 
first.  John  was  everything  that  I  was  not  —  stunningly 
handsome,  with  a  wonderful  disposition,  infinitely  at  ease. 
I  have  never  known  anyone  who  more  completely  satisfied 
every  test  of  perfect  friendship.  I  remember  admiring  him 
particularly  for  his  independence  of  mind.  For  one  thing, 
he  was  willing  to  admit  that  he  was  more  inclined  to  ruf- 
fle his  feathers  with  pride  after  shooting  a  New  England 
partridge  sitting  than  on  the  wing.  I  had  felt  this  way 
for  years  and  hunted  in  moccasins  so  as  to  creep  about 
the  woods  as  noiselessly  as  possible. 

Once,  walking  down  a  wood  road  in  New  Hampshire, 
I  happened  to  be  trailing  John  and  his  wife,  Eleanor,  by 
perhaps  fifty  or  sixty  yards.  I  saw  a  partridge  sitting  In  a 
birch  sapling  about  forty  yards  in  from  the  road.  The  bird 
had  his  neck  stretched  out  straight  up  in  the  air  and  his 
feathers  pressed  down  until  he  looked  just  about  the  size 
and  shape  of  a  rolling  pin.  I  snapped  my  gun  on  him  and 
killed  him  the  second  my  eyes  spied  him  and,  to  my  tre- 
mendous relief,  found  that  John  heartily  approved  of  what 
I  had  done.  I  do  not  think  he  would  have  approved  had  I 
ground-sluiced  quail,  but  he  knew,  of  course,  that  one  gets 
a  hundred  chances  to  kill  a  partridge  in  this  country  on 


Three  Friends  141 

the  wing  to  every  chance  to  get  one  sitting,  and  we  were 
both  pretty  good  wing  shots. 

John  PhiUips  had  a  keen  and  extraordinarily  versatile 
mind.  He  was  a  learned  gentleman  in  every  sense  of  the 
word.  Trained  as  a  doctor,  he  knew  that  his  heart  was  un- 
trustworthy but  made  up  his  mind  to  continue  to  live  as 
he  always  had,  and  he  died  in  the  woods  while  grouse 
shooting  on  A^onday,  November  14,  1938.  His  dog  had 
pointed  and  his  gun  was  cocked  when  he  fell.  He  went 
exactly  as  he  would  have  wanted  to  go.  His  family  asked 
me  to  write  a  few  lines  for  the  Boston  Transcript.  I  called 
up  the  editor's  office  and  found  that  I  had  but  a  few  mo- 
ments to  say  what  I  could  think  of  before  the  forms  were 
closed.  Under  the  stress  of  the  deepest  emotion  I  wrote 
these  lines:  — 

Yesterday  afternoon  my  wife  and  I  went  to  see  a 
picture  taken  in  the  Belgian  Congo.  It  was  beautifully 
done  but,  as  I  sat,  I  kept  thinking  to  myself  how  dif- 
ferent it  was  from  John  Phillips's  story  of  his  visit  to 
the  pygmies.  In  his  story  there  were  no  fanfaronade, 
no  hooey,  no  hardships,  no  dangers  passed,  and  yet  I 
saw  in  the  picture  one  little  man  tapping  his  drum 
who,  I  feel  quite  sure,  was  the  same  one  whose  funny 
little  face  John  and  I  had  often  laughed  at  when 
thumbing  over  his  albums. 

When  I  came  home  and  unlocked  the  front  door, 
my  daughter  Mary  stood  in  the  hall  and  her  voice 
cracked  as  she  said  to  me,  "Dr.  Phillips  died  this  after- 
noon in  New  Hampshire  while  out  gunning  with 
Wayne  Colby." 


142  Naturalist  at  Large 

In  the  best  tradition  of  all  our  museum  people,  John 
traveled  widely  to  collect,  or  for  sport,  but  never  had 
an  adventure.  He  went  to  the  Blue  Nile,  to  Kenya,  to 
Arabia  Petraea,  to  Greenland  and  Mexico,  often  to  the 
Northwest  and  pretty  much  all  over  the  United  States. 
He  never  wrote  much  about  his  travels.  We  all  wish 
that  he  had,  for,  during  his  later  years,  he  developed 
a  highly  characteristic  and  extraordinarily  charming 
style  which  came  only  after  long  practice  and  good 
hard  work,  for  John  was  not  a  natural-born  writer. 
His  essays  on  New  England  field  sports,  the  story  of 
the  woodcock  cover  and  the  birch  hillsides  and 
swamps  where  our  New  England  ruffed  grouse  gather, 
will  Hve  as  long  as  men  go  gunning  in  the  autumn. 

John  was  eight  years  older  than  I  am  and  I  have 
looked  up  to  him  ever  since  I  came  to  Boston  as  an 
example  to  be  admired  but  by  no  good  fortune  ever 
to  be  equaled.  He  was  so  modest,  so  selfless  and  so  ut- 
terly courageous.  I  constantly  felt  —  and  I  think  many 
of  John's  friends  did  —  that  he  was  made  of  a  finer 
clay  than  went  into  any  of  our  make-ups. 

New  England  did  one  first-rate  work  when  she  pro- 
duced him  and  I  do  not  believe  that  any  country  any- 
where has  done  better.  He,  of  all  our  generation,  stood 
out  as  talented  and  versatile  beyond  us  all.  His  thor- 
ough medical  training  brought  him  to  the  command  of 
a  field  hospital  of  a  Regular  Army  division  during  the 
World  War.  I  think  the  only  time  he  ever  spoke 
sharply  to  me  was  when  I  once  said  "base  hospital" 
instead  of  "field  hospital."  His  contributions  to  genet- 
ics were  timely  and  significant,  for  he  worked  in  that 


Three  Friends  143 

field  when  it  was  still  possible  to  squeeze  a  lot  from  a 
sponge  which  is  now  pretty  dry.  The  four  stately 
volumes  of  his  Natural  History  of  the  Ducks  he  pro- 
duced in  his  stride,  preparing  them  with  singularly  lit- 
tle effort  or  talk,  though  he  turned  out  a  better  and 
probably  more  lasting  monograph  than  any  of  his 
colleagues  have  ever  done. 

Phillips  has  gone  as  he  would  have  gone  had  he 
chosen  for  himself,  but  he  leaves  us  the  shadow  of  a 
great  name  and  the  benediction  of  a  great  friendship 
and  all  those  in  whose  hearts  he  will  ever  live  are  the 
better  for  his  example. 

"And  now  the  Sun  had  stretch'd  out  all  the  Hills, 
And  now  was  dropt  into  the  Western  bay; 
At  last  he  rose,  and  twitch'd  his  Mantle  blue: 
Tomorrow  to  fresh  Woods,  and  Pastures  new." 

Henry  Bryant  Bigelow  has  been  another  friend  whose 
example  has  swayed  me  more  than  he,  or  I,  for  that  mat- 
ter, will  ever  realize.  I  met  him  just  after  I  came  to  college 
and  recognized  him  at  once  as  a  great  naturalist.  He  was 
enough  older  than  I  so  that  he  exercised  a  natural  leader- 
ship without  either  of  us  knowing  it.  He  loved  duck  shoot- 
ing and  used  to  go  with  me  to  Barbour's  Hill,  on  the  bor- 
der of  Virginia  and  North  Carolina  on  the  beach.  This 
place  then  belonged  to  my  father;  it  has  now  passed  into 
the  hands  of  my  cousins.  We  had  some  wonderful  adven- 
tures together,  for  the  shooting  in  those  days  was  mem- 
orable indeed.  Henry  and  I  shot  about  equally  well,  but 
as  a  fisherman  he  was  infinitely  more  skillful  than  I.  I  en- 
vied him  his  journeys  with  Mr.  Agassiz  on  the  Albatross ^ 


144  Naturalist  at  Large 

but  much  more  for  the  principal  reason  why  Mr.  Agassiz 
took  him  as  a  companion.  For  Henry  is  an  artist  who  could 
have  done  far  more  than  paint  the  exquisite  illustrations  of 
the  jelly  fishes,  concerning  which  he  is  the  world's  author- 
ity. Henry's  manual  dexterity  with  any  tool,  as  well  as 
brush  or  pen,  is  in  sharp  contrast  to  my  inept  pair  of  hands. 
He  has  been  a  wise  and  sagacious  counselor. 

He  made  two  journeys  with  Mr.  Agassiz,  once  joining 
him  in  Ceylon,  to  board  a  small  ship  belonging  to  the  British 
India  Steam  Navigation  Company,  which  was  chartered 
for  a  visit  to  the  Maldive  Islands,  certainly  one  of  the  least- 
known  quarters  of  the  world.  In  fact  I  have  never  even 
spoken  to  anyone  else  who  has  ever  been  there.  On  my 
wall  hangs  a  picture  of  Mr.  Agassiz  seated  beside  the  Sul- 
tan of  the  Maldives,  one  Abdul  Abou  Hamadudu  with 
whom  Henry  carried  on  a  correspondence  for  some  time, 
The  poor  Sultan  must  have  fetched  up  in  some  sort  of 
jam  with  the  British  Raj,  for  the  last  letter  Henry  received 
said  the  Sultan  was  in  exile  in  Cairo. 

His  other  journey  was  on  the  old  Albatross,  a  research 
vessel  belonging  to  the  United  States  Bureau  of  Fisheries 
but  manned  by  the  United  States  Navy.  Mr.  Agassiz  ar- 
ranged to  use  her  for  a  number  of  long  voyages  on  a  basis 
of  sharing  expenses,  and  then  sharing  the  collections  made, 
with  the  government  institutions.  Henry  was  on  the  cruise 
known  as  the  Eastern  Tropical  Pacific  Expedition  and  it 
was  during  this  voyage  that  he  laid  the  foundations  for  the 
world-wide  reputation  which  he  now  enjoys  as  an  oceanog- 
rapher.  His  definition  of  the  effect  of  the  Humboldt  Cur- 
rent on  the  distribution  of  marine  Hfe  brought  forth  the 
highest  praise  from  Sir  John  Murray,  the  greatest  oceanog- 


Photo   by  A.    G.   Fairchild 

David  Fairchild  and  W  illiam  iMorton  Wheeler 


At  Bano  Colorado  Island,  1^2^ 


Photo  by   ([■.   W.   Welsh 

Henr\    B.  Bigelow 
Aboard  the  ""Grainpiisr  1913 


Photo   by   Pitidy 


John  C.  PhilHps 
1934 


f     ■■'^' 


Three  Friends  145 

rapher  of  his  time.  Sir  John  told  me  of  his  opinion  of 
Henry's  work  on  a  number  of  occasions. 

Henry  built  up  the  Woods  Hole  Oceanographic  Institu- 
tion out  of  nothing.  The  report  which  he  prepared  showing 
the  need  for  such  an  organization  induced  the  Rockefeller 
Foundation  to  endow  it,  and  the  Institution  is  now  doing 
admirable  research  for  the  United  States  Navy. 

A  third  friend  has  won  for  himself  a  place  quite  as  deep 
in  my  affections  as  John  or  Henry.  This  is  David  Fairchild. 
I  am  fortunate  in  that  my  best  men  friends  were  all  hand- 
some and  David  has  the  temperament  of  an  angel.  No  more 
lovable  human  being  ever  lived,  nor  anyone  who  could 
write  more  delightfully  charming  English  prose.  Every  sen- 
tence he  writes  is  crammed  with  unbelievable  grammatical 
errors,  yet  everything  he  writes  holds  one's  breathless  atten- 
tion. His  two  books.  Exploring  for  Flaiits  and  The  World 
Was  My  Garden,  have  made  him,  if  possible,  more  widely 
known  than  he  was  before. 

Marrying  Alexander  Graham  Bell's  daughter  put  him 
in  touch  with  all  that  was  best  in  Washington.  The  fact 
that  he  later  traveled  all  over  the  world  for  years  on  end 
simply  meant  that  he  left  a  stream  of  friends  behind  him 
on  every  continent.  As  Chief  Agricultural  Explorer  in  the 
Department  of  Agriculture,  he  has  affected  in  some  degree 
the  hfe  of  every  American.  The  very  wheat  of  which  our 
bread  is  made  is  a  better  wheat  than  was  grown  years  ago, 
and  David  had  a  hand  in  bringing  it  to  America.  I  make 
fun  of  him  because  he  has  no  bump  of  locality,  because  he 
loves  to  tilt  with  windmills,  because  he  would  like  to  be  a 
reformer  and  crusader,  which  I  am  not,  but  I  am  sure  he 


146  Naturalist  at  Large 

knows  in  the  bottom  of  his  heart  that  I  am  his  loyal  and 
loving  friend. 

Every  time  the  postman  comes  to  the  door  I  wonder 
whether,  by  great  good  fortune,  he  will  bring  me  a  letter 
from  David.  Here  is  a  sample,  picked  at  random  from 
among  hundreds  that  I  treasure:  — 

The  Kampong 
Coconut  Grove,  Florida 
July  5,  '42 

Dear  Tom: 

This  is  the  month  for  the  Kampong.  It's  the  month 
for  mangoes  beginning  to  ripen,  for  white  sapotes,  for 
guanabanas,  for  Poincianas  in  full  bloom,  for  palms 
in  their  full  glory  of  luxuriance,  for  Bauhinia  galpinii 
—  handsome  as  the  "flame"  Azalea  —  for  Heliconia  sp. 
at  the  swimming  pool,  for  Cereus  of  various  sorts,  for 
Aechmeas  and  Bromeliads  and  native  orchids  and 
"Natal"  pineapples  ripening  in  the  pineapple  patch. 

But  last,  not  least  by  any  means,  it's  the  month  for 
mosquitoes.  If  you  swell  up  when  they  bite  you,  it's 
a  month  to  avoid,  just  as  June  in  the  North  Woods 
is  a  poison  month  for  me  who  swell  up  and  go  blind 
when  a  black  fly  bomber  strikes  me. 

I  spent  a  forenoon  at  the  Fairchild  Tropical  Garden 
a  few  days  ago  and  find  things  are  in  pretty  good 
shape.  Planting  is  going  forward,  Mathews  is  keeping 
the  weeds  away  from  the  young  palms  pretty  well, 
and  an  amazing  growth  of  palm  fronds  is  being  made. 
Slowly  the  Palmetum  part  comes  up  out  of  the  little- 


Three  Friends  147 

plants-all-about  stage  and  enters  the  palm-grove  one 
where  patches  of  shade  are  cast  by  larger  leaves. 

Don't  let  anyone  try  to  convince  you,  Tom,  that 
most  young  palms  grow  well  in  bright  sunlight.  They 
need  plenty  of  dense  shade  at  the  start  off. 

The  Bailey  Palm  Glade  is  taking  form  and  although 
the  stonework  looks  now  rather  glaring,  a  year  of 
vines  will  make  it  look  a  century  old.  The  front  walls 
of  the  Garden  now  are  nearly  hidden  by  a  mass  of 
beautiful  vines  as  luxuriant  as  they  can  be. 

You  know  there  has  been  some  criticism  of  the 
fact  that  no  signs  were  set  up  to  mark  the  site  of  the 
Fairchild  Tropical  Garden.  Well,  now  there  are 
enough  to  stop  any  traffic  and  divert  it.  The  signs  are 
large  and  well  made  and  in  lots  of  good  style.  They 
would  do  honor  even  to  the  Arnold  Arboretum.  There 
are  four  of  them  forming  a  complete  stop  to  traffic. 
And  there  is  no  suggestion  whatever  of  their  being 
signs  to  catch  suckers.  I  am  much  pleased  with  them 
aside  from  a  certain  feeling  of  embarrassment  at  seeing 
my  family  name  played  up  so  prominently.  "Kellogg's 
Sanitarium,"  "Kresge's  Chain  Stores,"  "Ford  Cars," 
etc.,  etc.  You  know  how  I  feel. 

Of  the  human  happenings  on  the  porch  too  many 
have  occurred  even  to  outline  them.  Danish  Com- 
mando jfliers  from  the  Burma  Road  three  weeks  by 
air  from  the  fighting  zone;  Cabot  Coville  from  his 
month  in  Corregidor  with  MacArthur,  and  Quezon 
and  Sayre;  callers  from  Cuba  who  describe  a  country 
house  there  of  a  wealthy  Cuban  family  where  tivelve 
dogs  dine  in  the  dinijig  room  with  a  family  of  ten, 


148  Naturalist  at  Large 

all  together;  Dr.  Bugher  from  Bogota  going  back  with 
thousands  of  hypodermic  needles  to  inoculate  the  peo- 
ple there  against  yellow  fever,  etc.;  a  tea  planter  from 
Assam  living  on  $50.00  a  month  with  ^2000  sterling 
frozen  in  New  York. 

Crash!  !  I  hear  a  big  branch  fall  and  Sands  calls  up 
from  below  to  say  it's  an  overloaded  Haden  mango 
branch.  So  we  inill  have  green  mango  pie  for  dinner 
tonight  —  don't  you  want  a  slice?  Loomis  is  in  Wash- 
ington but  Sis  and  Jimmie  and  Alarjorie  are  helping 
on  the  mango  crop  here  and  also  cross  pollinating  the 
Pochote  flowers  at  9  p.m.  by  flashlight. 

We  use  the  fancy  salts  every  morning  and  so  have 
a  different  tg^  dish  each  time! 

Mangoes  will  come  along  soon  now.  They  aren't 
quite  ripe  yet. 

A  funny  thing  happened  June  30th.  The  censor 
called  up  and  asked  me,  "Have  you  any  relatives  in 
Panama?"  *'Yes,  indeed,"  I  said,  "  a  son  Graham  Bell 
and  his  wife  and  baby,  and  a  daughter,  Nancy  Bell 
Bates."  "Have  you  no  other  relatives?  Do  you  know 
of  any  other  David  Fairchild?"  he  asked.  I  said,  "Well, 
to  tell  you  the  truth,  I  thought  when  I  came  to  the 
telephone  that  my  son  might  have  cabled  me  that  a 
new  baby  boy  had  arrived  and  that  his  name  was 
'David  Fairchild,'  and  that  the  phone  call  was  to  take 
the  cable  message."  The  censor  laughed  and  hung  up. 

An  hour  or  two  later  came  the  cable  from  Graham, 
addressed  to  me:  "David  arrived  safely  and  well. 
Graham." 

The  poor  censor  was  puzzled  and  thought  he  had 


Three  Friends  149 

discovered  some  person  stepping  into  the  Canal  Zone 
without  advising  him. 

It  stands  about  80°  F.  now  at  night  but  with  a  fan 
it's  not  so  bad.  Did  you  ever  hear  of  a  big  crab  making 
right  for  you?  I  went  barefooted  with  a  flashhght 
about  3.30  last  night  to  read  the  thermometer  and  an 
enormous  crab  started  right  for  me.  I  had  no  other 
tool  than  my  flashlight  so  I  struck  at  it  with  that.  It 
fought  fiercely  and  I  had  the  terrible  feeling  —  "What 
if  the  flashlight  goes  out  and  leaves  me  there  in  the 
dark  barefooted  to  fight  this  crab?"  Luckily  I  knocked 
him  out  before  the  flash  went  out  and  retired  behind 
the  screen  door.  The  thing  was  so  sudden  and  so  fierce 
and  exciting  that  I  got  a  big  thrill  from  it  that  kept  me 
awake  until  dawn.  Strange  how  one's  environment 
irnpinges  on  one  when  he  least  expects  it!  I  fell  over 
a  big  oak  tree  root  below  my  study  and  busted  a  vein 
in  my  leg  and  the  leg  swelled  up  to  a  big  size  but  is 
all  right  now. 

That  fight  in  the  desert  sands  [Libya]  must  be  the 
nearest  approach  to  Hell  that  humans  ever  have  ex- 
perienced. And  for  what?  Because  of  an  insane  vision 
of  the  world  by  a  paranoiac  and  his  fanatics. 

Love  to  you  all  up  there  from  us  all  here. 

David 


CHAPTER  XIII 

Mr.  Justice  Holmes 


I 


FIRMLY  believe  there  Is  a  blind  spot  In  the  eye  of 
every  man  and,  although  I  know  that  I  shall  be  accused 
of  lese-majeste,  I  was  never  more  completely  convinced 
of  this  truth  than  with  Justice  OUver  Wendell  Holmes. 
Most  of  his  friends  maintained  that  he  was  entirely  aware 
of  his  own  intellectual  powers  and  their  limitations,  but 
his  friends  were  only  partially  correct.  He  read  constantly, 
quickly,  and  he  had  a  retentive  memory.  But  he  knew  of 
science  only  from  hearsay,  so  to  speak.  He  had  a  curiously 
definite  idea  about  science  —  an  utterly  erroneous  one  — 
which  is  one  held  by  many  laymen.  He  lumped  together 
those  sciences  which  may  really  be  called  exact  with  those 
which  are  much  more  arts. 

Let  me  exemplify.  Mathematics,  physics,  chemistr)'-, 
that  combination  of  biology  with  physics  and  chemistry 
which  we  call  physiology,  all  these  may  theoretically  be- 
come open  books  complete  to  the  last  word.  It  is  theoreti- 
cally possible  to  conceive  that  all  of  the  possible  questions 
which  concern  them  may  be  answered.  This  Is  not  true  of, 
say,  systematic  botany  or  systematic  zoology.  Here  we  may 
record  the  end  results,  perhaps  all  the  end  results,  in  the 
formation  of  genera,  species,  varieties,  and  races,  but  we 
can  never  expect  to  postulate  a  knowledge  of  all  the  reasons 
wliich  have  gone  into  the  making  of  each  of  these  cate- 


Mr.  Justice  Holmes  151 

gories.  The  motive  force  of  evolution  is  beyond  our  ken. 

This  view  Mr.  Holmes  could  not  or  would  not  under- 
stand. He  often  spoke  of  the  promise  which  science  held 
for  the  cosmos  of  the  future.  He  was  a  sincere,  confirmed, 
and  in  some  respects  quite  simple-minded  atheist.  He  be- 
lieved that  the  scientist,  given  time  and  painstaking  re- 
search, could  reasonably  be  expected  to  solve  all  prob- 
lems. He  saw  no  reason  to  personify  a  mystery,  and  it 
never  would  have  occurred  to  him  to  pray  to  "Him  to 
whom  all  hearts  are  open,  all  desires  known,  and  from 
whom  no  secrets  are  hid."  I  have  heard  him  explain  his 
attitude,  often  in  a  very  naive  way,  on  many,  many  occa- 
sions. I  never  felt  like  arguing  the  matter  with  him  be- 
cause I  was  usually  too  fascinated  listening  to  what  he 
had  to  say.  His  sparkling  choice  of  words,  his  superb  voice, 
and  his  personahty  held  one  spellbound. 

I  still  beheve  that  had  Justice  Holmes  known  as  much 
about  science  as  he  knew  about  philosophy,  ethics,  logistics, 
or  history,  he  would  have  been  forced  to  admit  that  there 
are  certain  categories  of  facts  for  which  science  holds  no 
key.  And  this  is  where  the  deist,  the  humble  soul  who 
makes  no  parade  of  his  religious  belief,  feels  positive  that 
he  has  something  quite  tangible,  which  the  atheist  has  not. 

Justice  Holmes  was  completely  happy  and  satisfied  but, 
in  regard  to  science,  he  was  extraordinarily  trusting  and 
uninformed.  With  all  his  learning,  with  all  his  vast  and 
mature  scholarship  which  gave  him  that  superb  beauty  of 
utterance,  of  imagery,  and  of  apt  quotation  which  deco- 
rated the  ornate  loveliness  of  his  literary  style,  Mr.  Holmes 
still  had  his  blind  spot. 


« 


152  Naturalist  at  Large 

Justice  Holmes  was  fond  of  the  ladies  and  he  made  no 
bones  about  it.  I  remember  once  walking  with  him  past 
a  war-bond  poster  by  Howard  Chandler  Christy.  It  was 
pasted  up  on  a  billboard  in  Washington.  The  Justice  hesi- 
tated before  the  extraordinarily  lovely  feminine  figure  and 
then  remarked,  "Gad,  if  we  could  only  see  her  without 
those  clothes!" 

I  came  to  know  him  well  because  my  mother-in-law 
was  not  only  a  relation  of  his  but  a  great  favorite  —  she 
was  a  person  of  the  most  stunning  beauty.  As  years  passed 
he  transferred  his  affection  to  my  wife,  saying  to  me  on 
more  than  one  occasion,  after  Cousin  Fanny's  death,  that 
he  loved  Rosamond  better  than  anyone  in  the  world.  He 
tolerated  me,  liked  to  go  walking  with  me,  and  talked  to 
me  for  hours  at  a  time  on  innumerable  occasions.  In  the 
first  place  we  were  next-door  neighbors  at  Beverly  Farms, 
and  in  the  second  place  I  represented  a  point  of  view  and 
a  vocation  with  which  he  had  little  familiarity.  His  intel- 
lectual curiosity  being  what  it  was,  I  think  he  was  inter- 
ested in  knowing  why  anyone  should  do  the  odd  tilings 
that  I  constantly  did. 

I  often  felt  that  it  was  a  strange  thing  that  Mr.  Holmes 
was  disinclined  to  admit  the  extraordinary  excellence 
which  was  personified  by  Robert  E.  Lee.  The  mere  fact 
that  Lee  was  a  "Rebel"  damned  him  completely.  Mrs. 
Theodore  Roosevelt  once  had  her  secretary  call  up  Mrs. 
Holmes,  asking  her  to  come  to  a  tea  which  she  was  giving 
on  short  notice  to  meet  General  Stonewall  Jackson's 
widow,  who  happened  to  be  in  Washington.  Mrs.  Holmes 
declined  the  invitation  and  gave  her  reason.  The  secretary 


Mr.  Justice  Holmes  1 5  3 

protested  that  Mrs.  Jackson  was  completely  reconstructed. 
Mrs.  Holmes  replied,  "But  I'm  not."  And  being  a  most 
completely  independent  being  she  stayed  away,  invitation 
to  the  White  House  notwithstanding. 

The  Justice  was  very  frank  concerning  his  likes  and 
dislikes  and  the  things  of  which  he  felt  himself  completely 
a  master.  He  was  extraordinarily  sentimental.  I  have  seen 
him  break  down  and  cry  so  that  he  would  have  to  dis- 
continue reading  some  of  the  poems  about  the  war,  which 
I  will  frankly  confess  I  could  not  have  read  myself  with- 
out acting  in  just  the  same  way.  For  while  at  first  sight 
he  was  austere,  apparently  inflexible,  indeed  the  personifi- 
cation of  the  ideal  judge,  he  nevertheless  had  a  warm  and 
tender  heart.  I  can  see  him  now  as  he  sobbed  unashamedly 
when  he  came  immediately  to  call  on  Rosamond  after  our 
only  son  died  on  September  3,  1933. 

The  Justice  was  an  inveterate  correspondent.  He  wrote, 
always  in  longhand,  rapidly  and  easily  for  hours  and  hours 
at  a  time.  Rosamond  knew  that  he  liked  a  box  of  good 
New  England  apples  in  the  autumn,  roses  at  Christmas,  a 
salmon  when  we  went  to  Canada  in  the  spring,  and  oranges 
from  Grandmother's  grove  at  Eau  Gallie.  Each  gift 
brought  a  charming  and  affectionate  letter,  like  the  one 
he  wrote  on  January  i,  1927:  — 

My  dear  Rosamond: 

The  first  letter  of  this  year  is  to  wish  you  a  Happy 
New  Year  and  to  thank  you  for  the  beautiful  roses 
that  were  put  upon  my  desk  half  an  hour  ago.  We 
began  to  be  cousins  in  good  earnest  last  summer  and  it 


154  Naturalist  at  Large 

made  me  very  happy.  You  and  Tom  are  both  dear  to 
us,  and  thank  you  for  this  evidence  that  you  remem- 
ber me. 

Ever  aifectionately  yours, 

O.  W.  Holmes 

That  was  the  summer  we  became  next-door  neighbors  at 
Beverly  Farms. 

On  January  29,  1932,  he  answered  my  wife,  who  had 
written  begging  him,  as  she  often  did,  to  put  his  reminis- 
cences, particularly  his  war  experiences,  on  paper.  He  re- 
plied: — 

My  dear  Rosamond: 

If  any  magnet  could  draw  me  from  the  mud  of 
silence,  you  would  do  the  trick,  but  I  should  no  more 
think  of  writing  an  autobiography  than  of  writing  an 
epic.  I  suppose  you  know  it  and  that  your  letter  is 
quasi-chaff .  It  was  a  delight  to  see  you  the  other  day. 
It  always  is.  I  am  a  pretty  well  preserved  old  cove 
and  I  still  know  a  charmer  when  I  see  her.  My  love 
to  Thomas. 

Your  affectionate, 

O.  W.  Holmes 

During  the  last  few  years  of  his  life  there  were  times 
when  correspondence  went  through  his  secretaries,  as 
writing  became  difficult  for  him.  In  January  1933,  I  sent 
him  a  copy  of  a  little  notice  which  I  had  privately  printed 
after  my  colleague  Outram  Bangs's  death.  I  thought  it  had 
a  flavor  which  possibly  might  please  the  Justice,  as  he  had 


Mr .  Justice  Holmes  155 

heard  me  talk  about  Outram  so  often.  His  secretary  (at 
that  time  Donald  Hiss)  replied  for  him  as  follows:  — 

My  dear  Mr.  Barbour: 

The  Justice  asks  me  to  say  that  he  is  sending  a  copy 
of  The  Speeches  to  you  for  Professor  Lowes.  He 
found  that  he  had  two  copies  and  therefore  is  sending 
you  this  one,  since  you  requested  it.  Also  the  Justice 
asks  me  to  thank  you  for  your  notice  concerning  Mr. 
Outram  Bangs,  which  impressed  him  very  much.  But 
he  says  that  he  notes  with  sorrow  that  you  use  the 
word  gU7i  as  a  verb,  to  wit:  gunning.  The  Justice  says 
that  he  does  not  feel  positive  about  this  word,  but  he 
does  know  that  he  has  nursed  a  prejudice  against  it 
since  childhood.  He  considers  it,  however,  only  "par- 
tial and  not  utter  damnation."  I  was  delighted,  per- 
sonally, with  your  use  of  gun,  as  earlier  in  the  year  I 
had  been  called  to  account  and  had  stated  in  a  plea 
for  mitigation  of  the  punishment  that  it  was  a  term 
used  by  duck  shooters  rather  generally  and  therefore 
should  be  accepted  to  a  certain  extent.  But,  of  course, 
I  held  little  hope!  The  Justice  sends  you  his  love  and 
hopes  to  see  you  very  soon. 

I  am, 

Sincerely  yours, 

Donald  Hiss 

I  playfully  replied:  — 

Dear  Mr.  Hiss: 

You  give  the  Justice  my  love,  my  thanks  for  the 
book,  and  my  most  complete  and  vigorous  scorn  at 


156  Naturalist  at  Large 

his  not  liking  one  of  my  favorite  verbs.  If  I  say  I  am 
going  "shooting,"  there  is  always  the  impUed  expecta- 
tion that  I  will  find  something  to  shoot,  whereas  when 
I  take  my  dog  and  go  "gunning,"  I  may  shoot  some- 
thing but  I  may  equally  well  walk  a  peaceful  day  with 
simply  a  little  added  weight  on  my  shoulder.  Also, 
praises  be  to  God,  I  note  that  the  dictionary  treats  the 
word  with  distinguished  courtesy.  What's  more  I  hke 
it  and  always  have  liked  it  and  I  love  to  use  it  —  but  I 
love  the  Justice  a  thousand  times  more.  Tell  him  just 
this. 

Hiss  answered:  "The  Justice  read  your  reply  to  his 
letter  with  much  pleasure  and  amusement.  His  message  to 
you  concerning  that  dispute  is,  'When  he  goes  to  Purga- 
tory he  will  get  rid  of  gunning.' " 

Justice  Holmes  was  one  of  the  greatest  men  I  ever  knew 
well  —  if  not  the  very  greatest.  What  made  him  seem  the 
greater  was  the  fact  that  he  was  not  omniscient  and  that 
his  trifling  foibles  and  frailties  accentuated  his  warm- 
hearted humanity. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

Lifework 

XHERE  are  many  different  kinds  of  museums  and  I 
know  little  or  nothing  about  museums  of  art  or  of  history, 
and  not  so  much  as  I  should  hke  to  know  about  museums 
of  archaeology  and  ethnology.  But  of  museums  attempting 
to  aid  public  instruction  or  advanced  instruction  in  biol- 
ogy, I  think  I  can  speak  ex  cathedra,  for  I  have  visited  cer- 
tainly a  hundred  of  them  and  have  worked  in  one  pretty 
much  all  of  my  hfe.  It  is  quite  natural  that  I  should  have 
asked  myself  a  thousand  times,  "Why  have  the  damn  things 
anyway?  Am  I  simply  caring  for  an  accumulation  of  junk 
in  the  final  analysis,  or  is  what  I  am  doing  serving  a  useful 
purpose?"  However,  when  I  look  back  on  the  number  of 
intelligent  questions  which  have  come  from  all  sorts  of 
persons,  and  which  I  think  I  have  answered,  I  feel  a  little 
more  encouraged  about  things. 

Of  course,  there  are  the  economic  aspects  of  museum 
service,  the  help  we  give  the  economic  entomologist,  the 
physician,  particularly  the  physician  in  the  tropics,  who 
is  up  against  insect-borne  diseases  and  snails  carrying  in- 
testinal parasites,  and  poisonous  snakes,  and  indeed  poison- 
ous animals,  running  from  vertebrates  to  jelly  fishes.  Some 
bats  convey  rabies  and  transmit  trypanosomiasis,  a  para- 
sitic disease  in  horses,  and  so  on  ad  mfi?iitu?n.  These  beasts 
cannot  be  talked  about  or  discussed  without  having  a  name 


158  Naturalist  at  Large 

to  call  them  by  and  that  name  has  got  to  be  the  right  name; 
otherwise  someone  reviewing  the  work  done  twenty  years 
later  interprets  that  work  in  terms  of  another  animal  and 
it  all  comes  to  naught. 

These,  however,  are  the  purely  practical  aspects  of  the 
usefulness  of  a  museum.  To  my  way  of  thinking,  they  are 
utilitarian  and  infinitely  subservient  to  a  point  of  view  set 
forth  by  Mr.  Eliot  in  his  essay  on  The  Aims  of  Higher 
Education:  — 

The  museums  of  a  great  university  are  crowded 
with  objects  of  the  most  wonderful  beauty  —  beauty 
of  form  and  beauty  of  color,  as  in  birds,  butterflies, 
flowers  and  minerals.  They  teach  classification,  suc- 
cession, transmutation,  growth  and  evolution;  but  they 
teach  also  the  abounding  beauty  and  loveliness  of  cre- 
ation. 

I  have  often  felt  the  stimulus  of  the  beauty  of  the  things 
which  it  has  been  my  privilege  to  handle.  Sir  Henry  Miers 
said  in  a  report  to  the  trustees  of  the  Carnegie  United 
Kingdom  Trust:  — 

It  is  by  means  of  exhibited  objects  to  instruct,  and 
to  inspire  with  the  desire  for  knowledge,  children 
and  adults  alike;  to  stimulate  not  only  a  keener  appre- 
ciation of  past  history  and  present  activities  but  also 
a  clearer  vision  of  the  potentialities  of  the  future.  They 
[and  here  he  is  speaking  of  museums  in  general]  should 
stir  the  interest  and  excite  the  imagination  of  the  ordi- 
nary visitor,  and  also  be  for  the  specialist  and  the 
student  the  fruitful  field  for  research. 


Lifenjuork  159 

I  cannot  emphasize  too  strongly  the  fact  that  the  pur- 
pose of  a  museum  hke  the  one  in  Boston  is  as  different 
from  that  of  the  one  in  Cambridge  as  chalk  is  from  cheese. 
For  financial  reasons,  the  Boston  Museum  must  limit  its 
field  to  pubHc  instruction,  to  support  such  activities  as  the 
Junior  Explorers,  to  provide  decent  service  for  public- 
school  classes.  The  Museum  in  Cambridge  supplements 
university  instruction  in  general  zoology,  comparative 
anatomy,  and  paleontology.  It  trains  curators  for  other 
museums.  Incidentally,  without  interfering  with  its  more 
important  activities,  it  provides  opportunity  for  instruction 
to  the  public-school  children  of  Cambridge  and  educational 
exhibits  on  a  limited  scale  for  persons  of  more  mature 
years.  It  is,  however,  primarily  a  museum  dedicated  to 
investigation  and  to  the  publication  of  the  results  thereof. 
It  deals  primarily  with  what  is  called  systematic  zoology 
—  taxonomy,  in  other  words;  and  Mr.  Charles  Regan  Wil- 
liams in  England  has  set  forth  concisely  and  explicitly 
what  taxonomy  is:  — 

The  value  of  Systematic  Zoology  is  generally  un- 
derstood, though  perhaps  still  occasionally  liable  to 
deprecation.  The  first  requisite  in  zoological  work  of 
any  kind  —  morphological,  economic,  or  any  other  — 
is  to  know  what  one  is  dealing  with;  before  we  can  so 
much  as  begin  on  any  other  problem,  we  must  know 
what  our  animals  are  —  must  have  them  described, 
named,  and  classified;  and  Systematic  Zoology,  which 
does  this,  is  thus  the  bed-rock  on  which  all  other 
zoological  research  ultimately  rests.  Such  work  stands 
for  all  time;  the  first  adequate  description  of  a  new 


160  Naturalist  at  Large 

animal  is  something  which  can  never  be  duplicated, 
never  repeated;  it  is  there,  once  for  all,  as  something 
to  be  appealed  to,  something  that  cannot,  by  the  rules 
under  which  the  systematist  works,  be  superseded.  It 
may  seem  to  be  of  little  interest  at  the  moment;  it  may 
not  be  recalled  for  years;  but  it  will  be  required,  and 
will  come  into  its  own  when  much  work  in  other 
branches  has  become  obsolete  through  change  of 
fashion  or  improved  technique,  or  has  been  shown  to 
be  useless  for  any  further  advance. 

One  year  when  I  was  feeling  homiletical  I  decided  to 
head  my  Annual  Report  with  a  text  and  I  chose  this  line: 
"A  satisfied  curator,  like  a  finished  museum,  is  damned 
and  done  for."  That  is  exactly  where  the  museum  is  like 
the  library.  It  has  got  to  keep  growing;  otherwise  its  sig- 
nificance ceases.  One  gets  more  books  and  the  other  gets 
more  critters.  There  is  no  great  difference  between  the 
two. 

Our  science  museums  at  Cambridge  form  such  a  patch- 
work quilt  that  a  great  deal  of  confusion  exists  concern- 
ing the  organization.  The  Museum  of  Comparative  Zool- 
ogy, built  from  money  appropriated  by  the  Massachusetts 
Legislature  and  that  donated  by  friends  of  Professor  Agas- 
siz,  is  housed  in  a  building  which  was  commenced  in  1859. 
A  gift  of  Mr.  Francis  Calley  Gray  settled  it  with  an  un- 
changeable name  and  a  cumbersome  one,  too  —  the  Mu- 
seum of  Comparative  Zoology  at  Harvard  College.  Then 
in  1876  Mr.  George  Peabody  chose  Cambridge,  along  with 
Salem  and  New  Haven,  for  the  establishment  of  museums 
of  several  sorts.  The  one  in  Cambridge  became  the  Peabody 


Lifeuuork  161 

Museum  of  Archaeology  and  Ethnology.  These  two  in- 
stitutions were  originally  independent,  affiliated  with  Har- 
vard College  but  not  controlled  by  it,  having  their  own 
boards  of  trustees,  and  hence  autonomous.  Later  they  con- 
veyed their  possessions  to  the  College,  each  forever  to 
have  a  self-perpetuating  governing  board,  confirmed  by 
the  governing  boards  of  Harvard  College,  and  each  having 
the  rights  and  prerogatives  of  a  faculty  in  the  University. 
These  two  museums  are  governed  in  this  way  to  this  day. 
Years  passed  and  other  buildings  to  house  Botanical,  Min- 
eralogical,  and  Geological  Museums  were  constructed,  and 
finally  the  whole  formed  one  continuous  structure. 

The  three  museums  last  mentioned  are  not  governed  by 
a  faculty.  The  general  control  of  the  building,  the  dis- 
tribution of  space  therein,  and  matters  affecting  more  than 
one  section,  such  as  repairs,  hours  of  opening  and  closing, 
etc.,  etc.,  make  it  desirable  to  have  one  official  responsible 
for  such  matters,  so  that  while  each  Museum  has  its  indi- 
vidual director,  I  have  the  title  of  Director  of  the  Uni- 
versity Museum  as  well  as  of  the  Museum  of  Compara- 
tive Zoology.  This  situation  might  conceivably  lead  to 
friction.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  it  leads  to  nothing  but  the 
pleasantest  and  most  friendly  associations.  The  Museum 
of  Comparative  Zoology  is  widely  and  very  happily  known 
as  the  Agassiz  Museum;  the  others  have  no  occasion  to  use 
other  than  their  own  official  styles.  As  with  so  many  of  the 
institutions  connected  with  Harvard  University,  which, 
like  Topsy,  just  growed,  the  complicated  setup,  which 
might  be  expected  to  be  cumbrous  and  unhandy,  works 
extremely  well. 


* 


162  Naturalist  at  Large 

One  of  the  pleasantest  features  of  life  in  the  Museum 
grew  entirely  by  chance.  During  one  long  spell  of  bad 
weather  Henry  Bigelow  and  I  began  to  bring  our  lunches 
to  the  Museum  and  ate  together  in  my  back  office.  Then 
it  occurred  to  me  that  we  had  in  Gilbert,  working  here 
in  the  Museum  at  odd  tasks,  a  most  courtly  old-fashioned 
colored  servant  who,  as  he  put  it  himself,  had  been  left  to 
the  Museum  with  Mr.  Brewster's  collection  of  birds.  We 
installed  an  electric  stove,  proper  sink  and  electric  refrig- 
erator, and  screened  these  objects  away  in  a  corner  of  my 
office,  which  is  a  large  one,  so  that  they  do  not  obtrude. 

William  Morton  W^heeler  joined  our  group  and  in  time 
the  Eateria  became  quite  an  institution.  As  long  as  Mr. 
Lowell  was  President  of  the  University  he  not  only  called 
up  frequently  and  said  that  he  was  coming  to  lunch  but 
brought  guests  who  he  thought  would  be  interested  in 
learning  about  the  Museum  under  entirely  informal  cir- 
cumstances. I  remember  one  day  he  brought  Sir  Frederic 
Kenyon  of  the  British  Museum  and  Sir  Henry  Miers  with 
him  and  they  paid  us  a  most  enjoyable  visit.  My  friend 
William  Claflin,  now  the  Treasurer  of  the  University  and 
its  most  useful  officer,  has  taken  up  this  same  practice  to 
our  great  advantage  and  joy. 

Rosamond  provided  a  lunchbook,  a  beautifully  bound 
parchment  volume.  Each  person  who  lunches  in  the  Eateria 
for  the  first  time  signs  his  name  in  full,  thereafter  only 
his  initials.  From  September  2,  1930,  to  September  18, 
1942,  there  have  been  over  20,800  signatures  in  this  book. 
We  have  kept  a  separate  book  for  distinguished  visitors 
in  which  there  are  about  300  names  for  the  same  period  of 
time.  A  casual  examination  shows  that  these  visitors  have 


Lifezvork  163 

come  from  Honduras,  Canal  Zone,  Cuba,  Norway,  Italy, 
Panama,  England,  British  Columbia,  Ontario,  Siam,  Bel- 
gium, Holland,  New  South  Wales,  Germany,  Trinidad 
(B.W.I.) ,  China,  Sweden,  Japan,  Brazil,  Federated  Malay 
States,  France,  Transvaal,  Cape  Colony  (South  Africa), 
Korea,  Denmark,  Scotland,  West  Australia,  Philippine 
Islands,  Colombia,  Venezuela,  British  North  Borneo,  and 
Bermuda,  but  without  checking  through  carefully  I  should 
say  there  had  been  more  visitors  from  Holland  than  from 
any  other  foreign  state.  These  books  have  proved  unex- 
pectedly useful  on  many  occasions.  When  was  so-and-so 
here  last?  Was  I  in  Cambridge  on  May  lo,  1938?  On 
dozens  of  occasions  they  have  solved  problems  which 
loomed  big  at  the  moment. 

The  luncheons  provided  opportunity  to  ask  members 
of  the  staff  in  for  informal  discussions  and  took  the  place 
of  formal  and  rather  stilted  staff  meetings.  I  find,  to  my 
surprise,  that  the  Eateria  has  acquired  a  considerable  fame 
and  that  scientific  visitors  to  the  Museum  look  forward  to 
an  invitation  with  real  anticipation.  It  has  been,  of  course, 
a  bit  of  trouble  at  times  but  it  has  certainly  served  a  most 
useful  purpose.  The  women  on  our  staff  have  been  cour- 
teous and  considerate  in  helping  to  serve  and  have  made 
themselves  generally  useful;  I  know  they  have  enjoyed  the 
institution  as  much  as  the  rest  of  us. 

On  January  7,  1942,  poor  Gilbert  died  and  the  Eateria 
has  been  maintained  on  a  rather  reduced  basis  ever  since. 
But  as  long  as  my  colleagues  live  they  will  remember  his 
beautifully  cooked  venison  and  ducks  after  my  shooting 
excursions.  On  state  occasions  we  had  terrapin  prepared 
at  the  Somerset  Club  in  town  and  brought  out  by  motor. 


164  Naturalist  at  Large 

I  have  tanks  in  the  basement  where  terrapins  and  turtles 
may  be  kept  against  the  visit  of  some  distinguished  visitor. 

David  Fairchild  has  provided  innumerable  tropical 
fruits:  white  sapotes,  aegles,  canistels,  mangoes,  and  many 
others,  and  a  grower  near  Homestead,  Florida,  who  has 
a  particularly  fine  strain  of  papayas,  has  supplied  these 
frequently. 

Thanks  to  Wilson  Popenoe,  a  disciple  of  David's  now  in 
Guatemala,  we  have  had  mangosteens.  The  Department  of 
Agriculture  once  put  a  stop  to  their  importation  on  the 
ground  that  they  were  hosts  of  a  pernicious  fruit  fly.  I 
knew  that  this  was  obvious  nonsense  and  now,  after  long 
argument  with  the  Department  and  after  much  experimen- 
tation, we  have  permits  to  import  mangosteens  and  will 
eat  them  frequently,  I  hope,  when  the  war  is  over. 

I  only  wish  that  we  could  look  ahead  fifty  years  and 
see  the  mangosteen,  queen  of  all  tropical  fruit,  abundant 
in  the  Boston  market.  The  United  Fruit  Company  has  a 
big  grove  of  bearing  trees  at  Lancetilla,  in  Honduras,  and 
can  easily  plant  more  if  the  demand  makes  it  worth  while. 
The  American  people,  however,  as  David  Fairchild  has 
long  ago  found  out,  are  slow  to  change  their  feeding  habits. 
Any  number  of  excellent  fruits  and  vegetables  from  all 
over  the  world  have  been  brought  to  America,  propagated 
for  a  short  time,  and  then  allowed  to  die  out.  I  cite  for 
example  the  Dasheen,  which  is  much  better  than  any  sweet 
potato,  the  Udo,  and  the  giant  radish  of  Japan. 

When  I  became  Director  of  the  Agassiz  Museum,  I  was 
highly  dissatisfied  with  the  situation  which  I  found  await- 
ing me.  Luckily,  at  that  time  I  had  the  means  to  make 


Lifenjoork  165 

changes  which  permitted  a  great  expansion  of  our  research 
activities.  The  Rockefeller  Foundation  had  provided 
money  for  a  new  biological  building,  which  took  most  of 
the  old  laboratories  out  of  the  Museum  where  they  had 
been  for  years,  but  the  space  so  vacated  was  still  not 
enough. 

I  had  long  had  the  idea  that  we  exhibited  many  more 
objects  than  there  was  need  to  show  to  our  rather  limited 
public,  and  I  felt  that  by  condensing  our  exhibits  we  could 
eliminate  obsolete  and  badly  prepared  material  and  at  the 
same  time  gain  space  for  expansion  of  the  research  col- 
lections. This  I  did  by  flooring  over  the  galleries  in  nine 
rooms  and  rearranging  all  of  the  exhibitions  on  the  third 
floor  of  the  building,  with  the  exception  of  our  paleonto- 
logical  specimens.  This  scheme  has  worked  out  very  satisfac- 
torily. Our  research  collections,  which  are  now  expanded, 
well-arranged,  and  quite  accessible,  are  as  much  a  credit  to 
the  University  as  is  its  great  Library.  Of  course,  I  can  take 
only  small  credit  for  this.  It  was  a  labor  of  love  for  many. 
In  1926  electric  lights  were  installed  throughout  the 
building  (there  had  only  been  gas  before!)  and  they  and 
an  electric  elevator  improved  the  working  conditions. 

Professor  Louis  Agassiz  designed  the  standard  tray 
which  we  have  used  throughout  the  Museum  except  in 
the  Departments  of  Birds  and  Mammals,  where  we  have 
received  many  good  storage  cases  which  came  to  us  with 
the  Brewster,  Thayer,  Bent,  Kennard,  and  Batchelder  col- 
lections. Since  birds  are  so  different  in  size,  our  arrange- 
ment in  this  department  is  more  or  less  haphazard.  The 
same  applies  to  the  mammals  except  that  with  these  we  tan 


166  Naturalist  at  Large 

the  hides  of  the  larger  forms  and  hang  them  up  on  rods 
in  a  large  room  which  we  keep  sterilized  against  moths 
and  other  pests.  But  generally  speaking,  standard  trays  are 
used  for  fossils,  alcoholic  material,  and  all  of  the  myriad 
types  of  material  which  are  gathered  in  the  Museum  pri- 
marily to  aid  investigators  and  not  to  instruct  the  public. 

The  trays  measure  i8  X  27/2  X  372  inches,  except  those 
in  the  Mollusks  Department,  where  they  use  a  good  many 
thousand.  Theirs  are  only  an  inch  deep  on  account  of  the 
small  size  of  most  of  the  material  involved.  These  trays 
are  contained  in  tall,  narrow,  glass-door  cupboards,  placed 
side  by  side,  each  containing  twenty  runners  spaced  so  that 
the  trays  slide  in  and  out.  For  very  heavy  objects  we 
simply  put  the  tray  in  upside  down  and  thus  it  becomes  a 
shelf.  Where  tall  jars  of  fish  or  reptiles  are  stored,  we  have 
to  use  a  tray  to  each  four  or  five  or  six  spaces.  Of  course 
no  system  is  universally  convenient,  but  our  trays,  now 
that  we  use  galvanized-iron  runs  to  support  them,  slide 
in  and  out  quite  easily  even  when  loaded  with  very  heavy 
material.  We  use  about  500  new  trays  a  year  and  estimate 
that  at  the  present  time  there  are  50,000  in  use  in  the 
building. 

It  is  idle  to  speculate  on  the  number  of  specimens,  for 
it  would  be  sheer  guesswork.  Mr.  Nathan  Banks,  for  in- 
stance, estimates  that  there  are  three  and  a  half  million 
insects  in  the  collection  and  knows  that  there  are  at  least 
30,000  types  —  that  is,  specimens  from  wliich  new  species 
have  been  described.  This  number  has  been  definitely  lo- 
cated; no  doubt  there  are  several  hundred  more  in  the 
collection  not  as  yet  found.  Our  insects  are  gradually  all 
being  worked  into  standard,  glass-topped,  airtight  trays 


■.iyiiiix^.^i:^i^ffi'^ 


A  sailback  lizard,  Edaphosaurus 


Almost  six  feet  long,  from  the  Red  Beds  of  Texas.  TI?e  only  one  ivith  perfect 
skull  and  all  skeleton  from  a  sini^le  individual 


ffffffffffff^' 


Unique  mount  of  Ophiacodon 

About  four  feet  long,  from  the  Red  Beds  of  Texas.  Laid  dozvv  about  one 
hundred  avd  eighty  iiiillion  years  ago 


Photos  bv  G.  Xelson 


Unique  type  of  Dynodontosaiirus  olheroi  Roiner 
from  southern  Brazil 

Three  of  George  Nelson's  finest  fossil  reptiles 


Lifework  167 

15  X  18  inches,  of  which  we  have  about  5000.  Many, 
many  insects,  however,  are  still  in  various  other  types  of 
cork-bottomed  boxes,  since  our  trays  are  rather  expensive 
and  we  cannot  buy  them  in  sufficient  numbers. 

In  view  of  their  fragile  nature,  and  contrary  to  our  prac- 
tice with  all  other  groups  of  animals,  we  are  inclined  to 
mount  our  vertebrate  fossils  and  put  them  on  pubUc  ex- 
hibition. Our  Chief  Preparator,  Mr.  George  Nelson,  is 
unexcelled  in  his  abiHty  to  make  graceful  and  lifelike 
mountings  and  restore  missing  parts  with  perfect  accuracy. 
Of  course  there  are  many  fossils  where  our  material  is 
too  incomplete  to  treat  in  this  way. 

In  all  other  groups,  types  are  preserved  for  the  use  of 
investigators  and  are  not  placed  on  exhibition.  A  recent 
count  shows  that  of  reptiles  and  amphibians  we  have  typical 
material  of  2173  named  forms. 


CHAPTER  XV 

The  Glory  Hole 


X 


HE  MAN  In  the  street  has  always  been  inclined  to 
look  down  his  nose  at  museum  curators,  and  for  as  long 
as  I  have  been  one  of  them  I  have  been  pondering  the 
reason,  I  think  I  have  it.  The  average  man  doesn't  like  a 
miser  and,  one  way  or  another,  the  curator  cannot  help 
appearing  miserly.  When  I  first  took  charge  of  the  Agasslz 
Museum,  I  found  one  big  glass  jar  filled  with  chicken 
heads,  another  with  burned  matches,  another  with  old 
rubbers.  The  chicken  heads  were  potential  material  for 
dissection,  and  the  fact  that  a  dollar's  worth  of  heads  filled 
a  twenty-dollar  jar  never  occurred  to  the  man  who  ate 
those  chickens,  who  was  no  other  than  Louis  Agassiz 
himself. 

The  Museum  at  one  time  housed  an  unbelievable  num- 
ber of  strange  odds  and  ends  accumulated  through  the 
years  and  saved  because  the  old-time  museum  man  thought 
it  was  a  sin  to  throw  anything  out.  I  have  been  accused 
of  erring  in  this  manner  myself.  It  is  true  that  if  you  look 
at  a  thing  long  enough  you  lose  perspective.  Any  object, 
no  matter  how  revolting  and  loathsome,  seen  sufficiently 
often,  blunts  the  senses,  and  one  becomes  disinclined  to  the 
effort  necessary  to  destroy  it  or  get  rid  of  it. 

Pride  of  possession  is  a  curious  attribute  of  mankind.  This 
was  brought  sharply  to  my  mind  recently  when  it  occurred 


The  Glory  Hole  169 

to  me  to  ask  myself,  "Why  didn't  Mrs.  Chase  give  the  Pea- 
body  Museum  her  gallstones?"  Many  other  people  had,  for 
there  were  a  pint  or  more  of  miscellaneous  gallstones  in  the 
Peabody  Museum  in  Salem,  curiously  enough  in  the  case 
with  an  old  reindeer.  But  these  were  donated  gallstones; 
it  was  only  Mrs.  Chase's  that  were  on  loan.  The  answer 
is,  Mrs.  Chase's  gallstones  were  larger  than  any  others  in 
the  whole  place  and  she  obviously  just  couldn't  bear  to 
part  with  them  permanently.  I  bethought  me,  Has  this  sit- 
uation ever  occurred  before?  And  then  I  remembered  that 
not  long  ago  I  was  reading  the  last  Annual  Report  of  the 
Curator  of  the  Museum  of  the  Royal  College  of  Surgeons 
in  London.  This  venerable  institution,  containing  much 
material  that  was  priceless  indeed,  suffered  a  direct  hit 
from  a  German  bomb.  It  was  almost  completely  destroyed, 
and  the  story  of  the  catastrophe  was  told,  sadly  and  meticu- 
lously, by  its  distinguished  curator.  But  if  our  friend  in  the 
street  were  to  read  this  report  he  might  be  inclined  to  laugh 
heretically  at  the  cool  and  unemotional  statement  that  along 
with  the  many  terrific  losses  suffered  by  that  venerable 
institution  were  listed  the  facts  that  the  jar  containing 
Napoleon's  bowels  was  cracked  and  that  the  rib  of  Robert 
the  Bruce  was  broken. 

I  have  found  myself  justifying  the  preservation  of  ob- 
jects which  were  inherently  unpleasing  to  the  eye  by  say- 
ing, "That  illustrates  the  taxidermy  of  a  hundred  years 
ago."  Or  the  preservation  of  a  codfish  pickled  in  alcohol 
by  saying,  "Someone  may  want  to  dissect  that  fish  some- 
time," forgetting  that  fresh  cod,  infinitely  preferable  for 
dissection,  are  plentiful  in  the  Boston  area.  And  so  it  goes. 
The  more  I  think  of  it,  the  more  I  believe  that  the  average 


170  Naturalist  at  Large 

man  is  entirely  entitled  to  his  opinion  and  the  average 
curator  is  a  queer  fish. 

Now  granted  that  the  curator  is  a  queer  fish,  is  he  a  rare 
fish?  I  fear  me  the  answer  today  is  nay.  My  friend  Alex- 
ander Wetmore,  Director  of  the  United  States  National 
Museum,  in  an  address  at  the  opening  of  the  Dyche  Mu- 
seum at  the  University  of  Kansas,  remarked,  "There  are 
today  throughout  the  world  more  than  seven  thousand 
museums,  of  which  more  than  a  thousand  are  in  the  United 
States."  Every  museum  has  at  least  one  curator,  and  the 
breed  came  into  being,  no  doubt,  back  in  the  days  when 
the  "Repositerry  of  Curiosity,"  the  Anlage  of  our  Uni- 
versity Museum  here  at  Harvard,  was  visited  by  Francis 
Goelet  on  the  twenty-fifth  of  October  1750.  Unfortu- 
nately, Mr.  Goelet  does  not  tell  us  how  old  the  museum 
was  at  that  date.  He  does,  however,  tell  us  that  its  treasures 
included  "horns  and  bones,  fishes'  skins  and  other  objects, 
and  a  piece  of  tanned  Negro  hide."  ^ 

Professor  John  Winthrop,  Hollis  Professor  of  Mathe- 
matics and  Natural  Philosophy,  evidently  had  started  even 
at  this  early  date  to  make  what  we  call  a  "Glory  Hole."  I 
have  had  some  interesting  experiences  cleaning  out  "Glory 
Holes"  in  Cambridge,  Boston,  and  Salem.  Only  a  few 
months  ago  I  opened  a  parcel  in  Salem,  the  wrapping  paper 
of  which  was  superscribed,  "Please  do  not  disturb  these 
shells.  Caleb  Cooke,  February  1857."  This  behest  had  been 
scrupulously  obeyed  for  eighty-five  years  and  six  months. 
The  parcel  proved  to  be  pure  gold,  for  the  shells  were 

^  It's  a  pity  this  burned.  Wendell  Phillips  could  have  waved 
it  instead  of  the  bloody  shirt. 


The  Glory  Hole  171 

collected  from  one  of  our  New  England  rivers  in  which 
today  it  would  be  impossible  to  collect  a  single  living 
thing,  so  polluted  have  its  waters  become.  I  hold  in  my 
hand  a  little  vial  in  wliich  is  a  label  saying,  "This  vial  con- 
tains two  feathers  of  a  large  penguin."  One  wonders  why 
these  two  feathers  out  of  the  tens  of  thousands  which  that 
penguin  carried  were  singled  out  for  preservation. 

The  only  old  museum  I  ever  saw  where,  so  far  as  I  could 
see,  there  was  no  Glory  Hole  was  the  museum  in  Charles- 
ton, South  Carolina.  This  venerable  institution,  founded 
in  1773,  has  had  plenty  of  time  to  accumulate  one,  but  the 
gay  and  carefree  cavaliers  of  the  South  were  willing  to 
throw  things  away  even  when  they  became  museum  cura- 
tors, while  the  penny-pinching  men  of  the  New  England 
states  fairly  reveled  in  the  making  of  Glory  Holes.  Cer- 
tainly nothing  equaling  the  collections  of  zoological  atroci- 
ties once  preserved  in  Boston,  Salem,  and  Cambridge  has 
ever  been  known  in  America,  and  probably  but  seldom  in 
Europe.  I  remember  one  of  my  colleagues,  now  passed  to 
his  reward,  pointing  regularly  to  a  certain  cask  and  saying, 
"That's  filled  with  the  pickled  heads  of  Chinese."  Well, 
it  was.  They  were  garnered  on  the  beach  at  San  Francisco 
years  ago  after  a  battle,  by  Thomas  G.  Carey,  no  less.  Now 
after  some  seventy  years  these  heads,  boiled  out  and  the 
skulls  bleached  and  cleaned,  serve  a  useful  purpose:  Hooton 
of  Harvard  uses  them  in  teaching  physical  anthropology. 

Alexander  Agassiz  collected  but  one  living  spirula,  a 
little  squidlike  mollusk  whose  dried  shells  may  be  found 
along  the  beaches  of  the  tropics  in  countless  thousands.  The 
living  spirula  carried  an  important  message,  for  its  shell 
was  like  certain  fossil  shells  of  ages  ago  and  gave  us  a  clew 


172  Naturalist  at  Large 

to  what  the  soft  parts  of  those  fossil  animals  were  like. 
That  spirula  disappeared  about  forty-five  years  ago  from 
the  very  desk  at  which  I  now  sit  writing  these  lines  and  it 
has  never  been  seen  from  that  day  to  this. 

Mr.  Alexander  Agassiz  always  said  that  Professor  E.  D. 
Cope  was  the  greatest  thief  in  the  world,  for  the  reason 
that  he  stole  the  largest  object  ever  stolen.  The  story  ran 
something  like  this:  Captain  Atwood  of  Provincetown, 
who  did  the  Museum  many  good  turns,  once  notified  Mr. 
Agassiz  that  a  strange  whale  had  drifted  ashore  on  the 
Outer  Cape.  Mr.  Agassiz  asked  J.  A.  Allen  and  some  stu- 
dents to  go  down  and  rough  out  the  skeleton.  This  they 
did,  and  laid  out  the  partially  cleaned  bones  on  a  flatcar. 
They  little  dreamed  that  Dr.  Cope  from  Philadelphia  also 
had  a  scout  on  the  Outer  Cape,  and  Cope  was  a  canny  man. 
He  went  to  Provincetown,  hired  a  room  in  a  farmhouse, 
where  he  could  watch  proceedings,  and  waited  until  the 
Cambridge  crew  went  home.  Then  he  greased  the  palm 
of  the  station  agent  to  the  end  that  a  Philadelphia  waybill 
instead  of  a  Cambridge  waybill  was  afHxed  to  the  flatcar 
and  the  whale  ended  up  as  the  type  of  a  new  species  which 
Mr.  Cope  described,  its  skeleton  still  being  preserved  at 
the  Academy  of  Natural  Sciences  in  Pliiladelphia.  So  the 
story  runs,  and  I  have  often  heard  it  told  in  the  past. 

I  can  hear  the  reader  mildly  say,  "Why  on  earth  does 
anyone  want  to  be  a  museum  curator?"  This  question, 
however,  I  can  answer  bravely  and  with  positive  assur- 
ance. To  one  who  has  by  inheritance  or  training  acquired 
the  pack-rat  instinct  it  is  the  most  exciting  calling  in  the 
whole  world.  For  who,  having  a  spark  of  imagination. 


The  Glory  Hole  17  3 

could  fail  to  be  thrilled  to  hold  in  his  hand  our  specimen 
of  Drepanis  pacifica?  This  was  the  bird  from  which  the 
feathers  were  taken  to  make  the  royal  robe  of  Kamehameha 
the  Great.  The  bird  is  extinct  and  our  specimen  was  col- 
lected by  Bloxam,  who  sailed  on  the  Blond.  It  is,  moreover, 
the  cotype  of  a  species.  Any  naturalist  will  know  what  I 
mean. 

Edward  S.  Morse  wrote  an  article  for  the  Atlantic 
Monthly  in  July  1893,  entitled  "If  PubUc  Libraries  Why 
Not  Public  Museums."  I  think  Morse  was  entirely  wrong 
in  the  type  of  museum  which  he  outlined  as  being  instruc- 
tive to  the  public.  Morse's  all-consuming  intellectual  curi- 
osity led  him  to  believe  that  all  of  us  were  similarly  en- 
dowed, as  of  course  we  are  not.  Bits  of  desiccated  slime  in 
a  row  of  bottles  carefully  labeled  captured  Morse's  inter- 
est just  as  rows  of  rock  samples,  all  looking  more  or  less 
alike,  enabled  him  to  point  with  pride  to  the  fact  that  this 
exhibit  included  a  piece  of  every  sort  of  rock  found  in 
Essex  County.  This  sort  of  material  has  no  value  for  pur- 
poses of  public  instruction;  nothing  has  except  that  which 
is  inherently  attractive. 

The  Mineralogical  Hall  in  the  University  Museum  in 
Cambridge  contains  a  vast  number  of  objects  of  the  most 
extreme  beauty  and  rarity,  yet  not  one  person  in  a  thou- 
sand who  comes  to  see  the  glass  flowers  in  an  adjoining 
hall  steps  across  the  threshold  to  look  at  the  minerals.  This 
was  even  more  conspicuously  the  case  in  the  museum  in 
Salem,  where  the  minerals  were  relatively  inaccessible  and 
really  only  displayed  for  the  instruction  of  public-school 
classes,  and  the  number  of  visits  made  by  such  classes  had 


174  Naturalist  at  Large 

dwindled  to  one  a  year  and  that  class  only  looked  at  about 
half  a  dozen  minerals.  The  glass  models  of  plants  in  Cam- 
bridge and  the  equally  beautiful  botanical  models  in  the 
Field  Museum  in  Chicago  interest  and  attract  the  public. 
Samples  of  wood  and  dried  foliage  have  absolutely  no  value 
for  exhibition. 

This  is  how  I  came  to  think  up  a  new  kind  of  museum. 
The  trustees  of  the  Peabody  Museum  in  Salem  voted  to 
restore  East  India  Hall  to  its  original  monumental  sim- 
plicity and  to  display  here  figureheads  of  ships  and  other 
objects  that  are  best  seen  from  a  distance.  The  Hall  for 
years  had  been  filled  with  a  jittery  miscellany  of  zoological 
objects.  There  was  a  good  representation  of  the  fauna  of 
Essex  County,  specimens  excellently  prepared.  All  else  was 
a  miscellaneous  accumulation,  acquired  through  the  years 
from  sea  captains  and  others,  of  specimens  which  varied 
in  quality  from  the  utterly  revolting  to  a  few  really  fine 
things.  It  was  easy  to  dispose  of  the  repulsive  material. 
Some  of  it  had  scientific  value  and  the  rest  of  it,  when 
tossed  out  of  a  second-story  window  into  the  back  yard 
on  Charter  Street  in  Salem,  was  fought  for  by  a  swarm  of 
urchins,  who  carried  the  critters  off  in  triumph.  The  police, 
at  first  unbelieving  and  suspecting  theft,  soon  became  ac- 
quiescent. 

The  question  was  what  to  do  with  the  few  good  things 
which  did  not  illustrate  the  zoology  of  Essex  County. 
These  naturally  presented  a  dilemma.  I  proposed  discard- 
ing them  all.  Then  one  day  I  chanced  to  lunch  with  Gus 
Loring  and  Stephen  W.  Phillips,  men  of  original  mind  and 
deep  learning,  who  had  an  honest  sentimental  feeling  for 
some  of  the  objects  I  proposed  to  discard.  It  was  quite  ob- 


The  Glory  Hole  175 

vious  that  I  could  not  proceed  without  seriously  wound- 
ing feelings.  I  suddenly  thought,  "See  if  we  can't  make  a 
human-interest  story  out  of  each  one;  display  the  object 
with  its  relation  to  man."  A  sort  of  rough  classification 
gradually  grew  on  me.  There  was  a  good  skylark,  and  a 
good  wandering  albatross.  Get  a  nightingale  and  set  up  a 
display.  Label  it  "These  birds  have  inspired  great  poetry." 
Use  pictures  of  the  poets,  facsimiles  of  the  poems,  and  some 
of  the  most  superb  verses  in  boldly  typed  labels. 

What  do  domesticated  animals  teach  us  beside  carving 
at  table?  Domestic  fowl  and  the  pigeon  have  been  ex- 
traordinarily plastic  in  man's  hands.  Think  of  the  contrast 
between  a  Shanghai  rooster  and  a  Seabright  bantam.  The 
Shanghai  and  the  Langshan  are  the  largest  of  the  so-called 
Asiatic  breeds  of  fowl,  enormous  creatures  standing  over 
two  feet  high.  The  breeds  are  now  out  of  fashion  and 
almost  extinct.  Luckily  the  Museum  had  some  really  his- 
toric fowls.  Here  was  the  rooster  brought  back  over  a  hun- 
dred years  ago,  the  progenitor  of  the  stock  which  gave 
rise  to  the  Rhode  Island  Red.  And  I  found  a  wild  jungle 
fowl  which  could  be  spared  from  the  collections  in  Cam- 
bridge. With  the  help  of  my  neighbor  Harry  McKean, 
I  soon  had  plans  for  this  exhibit  well  under  way. 

Various  species  of  jungle  fowl,  which  look  exactly  like 
small  game  chickens,  are  found  all  over  southeastern  Asia. 
When  you  are  living  in  the  country  where  they  occur,  you 
seldom  see  them,  but  their  crowing  at  morning  and  evening 
sometimes  becomes  a  positive  nuisance.  Now,  conversely, 
although  there  is  no  reason  to  believe  that  the  Aztecs  did 
not  hold  the  turkey  in  domestication  for  as  long  a  time  as 


176  Naturalist  at  Large 

any  of  the  peoples  of  Asia  had  the  fowl,  the  turkey  has 
not  proved  plastic  at  all.  Cortez  sent  domesticated  birds 
which  he  found  in  Mexico  back  to  Europe.  From  there 
they  spread  all  over  the  world.  They  came  to  New  Eng- 
land, and  to  this  day  domesticated  turkeys,  most  of  them, 
are  hard  to  tell  from  wild  birds.  A  few  varieties  have  been 
produced,  but  only  by  the  chance  dropping  out  of  ele- 
ments of  the  normal  pigmentation  of  the  bird's  plumage. 
In  the  reddish-colored  turkeys,  the  black  or  the  dilute  black 
pigment  —  the  gray  —  has  gone  and  the  red  element  alone 
remains.  In  the  white  turkeys  all  pigmentation  has  disap- 
peared; albino  races  are  always  easy  to  produce  in  domes- 
tication. White  rats  and  mice  and  guinea  pigs  come  to 
mind,  as  well  as  leghorn  fowl  and  fantail  pigeons. 

I  visualized  an  exhibit  around  William  Endicott's  mag- 
nificent bull  bison,  not  using  the  animal  as  a  zoological 
object,  a  member  of  the  Bovidae,  but  as  a  creature  which 
provided  food,  shelter,  sport,  and  even  an  object  of  wor- 
ship  to  many  tribes  of  Indians.  And  here  illustrative  mate- 
rial is  abundant  and  spectacular. 

The  Museum  had  a  first-class  ostrich,  given  it  some 
years  ago  by  Mrs.  Stephen  Philhps  —  an  ostrich  far  too 
good  to  throw  away.  By  good  fortune,  I  had  a  sample  of 
dried  ostrich  meat,  one  of  the  various  kinds  of  "biltong" 
carried  by  the  Boers  as  rations  when  at  war  or  on  trek. 
An  ostrich  feather  fan,  an  old-time  bonnet,  and  headdresses 
of  the  Nandi  Masai  all  proved  obtainable. 

Tliink  what  a  story  you  can  build  about  the  giant  tor- 
toise of  the  Galapagos.  The  old  whalers  called  them  turpin. 
For  generations  all  of  the  ships  that  chanced  to  be  near  the 
Galapagos  Islands,  about  six  hundred  miles  southwestward 


The  Glory  Hole  111 

of  Panama,  went  ashore  turtling.  The  crews  carried  the 
beasts  down  to  the  beach,  boated  them  to  the  ships,  and 
piled  them  up  in  their  empty  holds.  Here,  being  the  strange 
creatures  that  they  are,  they  survived  for  months  without 
food  or  water.  When  scurvy  appeared  the  turtles  were 
butchered.  The  flesh  was  savory  even  when  poorly  pre- 
pared. There  was  enough  fat  in  each  one  to  shorten  a  mess 
of  "duff,"  and  the  water  in  their  bladders  was  cool  and 
clear.  I  have  seen  a  compilation  made  from  about  thirty 
whalers'  logs  which  shows  that  they  carried  off  more  than 
eleven  thousand  of  these  animals.  Once  they  occurred  in 
countless  multitudes  on  no  fewer  than  nine  of  the  islands. 
Seventeen  zoological  species  of  turtles  have  been  described. 
But  this  is  not  the  point  which  we  want  the  magnificent 
specimen  at  Salem  to  illustrate  —  rather,  what  turtles  like 
this  meant  to  seamen  from  the  time  of  Dampier  down 
to  about  1867,  when  petroleum  knocked  out  whale  oil. 
Probably  no  less  than  half  a  million  turpin  were  carried 
away,  and  now  all  the  races  of  the  creatures  are  rare  or 
extinct. 

Captain  Phillips  brought  back  from  Fiji  an  enormous 
giant  clam.  The  superb  pair  of  matched  valves  are  at  least 
three  feet  long  and  weigh  over  a  hundred  pounds  each. 
But  I  don't  want  this  to  be  a  malacological  specimen  — 
rather,  the  terror  of  the  pearl  diver.  For  if  a  diver  inad- 
vertently thrust  a  hand  or  a  foot  into  one  of  these  gaping 
shells  as  it  yawned  open,  the  instant  reaction  was  for  the 
animal  to  close  up,  like  any  other  clam,  and  the  death  of 
the  diver  ensued. 

These  giant  clams  were  undoubtedly  eaten,  the  meat 
being  chopped  fine  and  stewed.  No  doubt  it  was  as  good 


178  Naturalist  at  Large 

as  conch,  most  delectable  of  all  sea  viands,  unfortunately 
unprocurable  in  New  England.  What  a  dramatic  under- 
water scene  could  be  depicted  with  modern  methods  of 
creating  illusions!  Mold  a  lovely  Polynesian  maiden  vested 
only  with  a  net  reticule  of  pearl  shells  tied  to  her  waist 
and  struggling  for  release  from  the  clutch  of  this  giant  mol- 
lusk.  I  fear,  however,  such  pageantry  is  beyond  our  means 
—  and  might  shock  Salem,  anyhow. 

It  is  probable  that  all  of  the  various  races  of  domestic 
duck  are  derived  from  the  wild  mallard,  and  where  man 
first  began  to  breed  ducks  for  food  is  doubtful.  It  was 
probably  in  China.  Anyone  who  has  traveled  into  the  in- 
terior of  China,  say  up  the  Si-kiang  River  from  Canton 
to  Wuchow,  will  recall  the  floating  duck  farms.  These 
great  arks  built  on  rafts  move  about  from  place  to  place, 
a  gangplank  is  let  down,  and  the  ducks  scuttle  overboard 
and  dip  and  dive  and  feed.  At  evening  the  proprietor  of 
the  establishment  stands  by  with  a  bamboo  wand  and  beats 
a  gong  and  the  ducks  rush  up  the  gangway,  for  they  know 
from  bitter  experience  that  the  last  few  ducks  will  be 
assiduously  whacked  with  the  bamboo  just  for  being  last. 

The  people  in  Bali  have  had  the  duck  for  years.  The 
characteristic  race  is  a  white  one  with  a  large  fluffy  top- 
knot, and  the  Balinese  positively  assure  us  that  unless  a 
bunch  of  cotton  wool  on  top  of  a  twig  is  put  before  the 
setting  duck  where  she  must  observe  it  constantly,  the 
young  will  not  be  bedecked  with  the  much  admired 
pompon  of  feathers  on  their  heads.  And  though  unques- 
tionably man  has  played  with  the  duck  for  a  long  time,  no 
such  enormous  variety  of  named  races  has  been  produced 


The  Glory  Hole  179 

as  in  the  case  of  the  fowl.  The  Muscovy  duck  is  far  dis- 
tantly related  to  all  the  rest  of  its  kin.  This  bird  is  found  in 
a  wild  state  tlirough  the  tropical  lowlands  of  Central  and 
South  America.  By  this  I  mean,  of  course,  the  forested  areas. 
It  was  domesticated  in  Mexico,  and  possibly  by  other  In- 
dian tribes  than  the  Aztecs.  When  it  was  brought  to  Eu- 
rope, the  tradition  of  its  origin  was  apparently  lost,  but 
just  why  it  should  have  been  considered  to  be  of  Muscovite 
origin  I  can't  remember,  although  I  have  been  told.  Except 
for  albino  and  pied  individuals,  most  of  the  Muscovy  ducks 
are  essentially  the  same  as  their  wild  ancestors.  This  is  also 
true  of  the  guinea  hens  which  came  to  America  on  the 
slave  ships  from  West  Africa.  As  everybody  knows,  these 
can  hardly  be  called  domesticated.  They  have  a  tendency 
to  run  wild,  and  indeed  in  many  localities  in  Haiti  and 
Cuba  they  afford  good  sport  with  a  shotgun,  being  strong, 
fast  flyers. 

Look  at  the  pigeons  on  Boston  Common  and  you  will 
be  struck  by  the  fact  that  the  vast  majority  of  them  are 
essentially  hke  the  blue  rock  dove,  which  is  their  wild 
ancestor.  Man  has  produced  an  extraordinary  number  of 
bizarre  and  curious  types  of  pigeon,  but  let  them  become 
feral,  as  they  have  in  Boston  or  Venice,  and  they  revert 
to  the  ancestral  type,  at  least  in  a  vast  majority  of  cases. 
And  the  accidental  additions  which  come  from  escaped 
fancy  pigeons  are  soon  bred  out  and  absorbed  into  the 
essentially  blue  rock  mass  of  the  population.  But  I  don't 
want  to  crowd  our  museum  at  Salem  to  where  it  appears 
to  overstress  the  exhibition  of  domesticated  animals.  This 
aspect  has  been  treated  elsewhere.  There  is  a  wonderful 
collection  of  all  sorts  of  domesticated  types  at  the  British 


180  Naturalist  at  Large 

Museum  of  Natural  History  in  London,  of  dogs  at  Yale, 
and  a  fair  synoptic  collection  in  Cambridge. 

A  good  many  dyed  plumes  of  birds  of  paradise  seized 
in  the  Customhouse  and  turned  over  to  the  Peabody  Mu- 
seum for  exhibition  recalls  the  trade  in  birds  of  paradise. 
When  the  Dutch  and  Portuguese  first  arrived  in  the  Moluc- 
cas, they  found  some  of  the  Malay  sultans  receiving  dried 
skins  of  birds  of  paradise  as  tribute  from  Papuan  tribes 
of  savages  who  owed  them  suzerainty.  These  skins  were 
legless,  and  the  notion  grew  that  the  birds  spent  their  lives 
flying  in  the  air  and  admiring  the  sun.  During  the  last 
years  of  the  last  century  and  the  first  decade  of  this  the 
number  of  birds  of  paradise  which  were  garnered  from 
the  western  part  of  New  Guinea  and  the  Aru  Islands  was 
stupendous.  Queen  Wilhelmina  stopped  the  slaughter  some 
years  ago.  But  birds  of  paradise  were  still  abundant,  even 
considering  the  enormous  numbers  killed  for  trade,  because 
the  females  were  so  inconspicuous  and  so  utterly  unlike 
the  males  that  they  were  never  disturbed  and  all  the  species 
are  highly  polygamous. 

And  so,  to  my  great  surprise,  I  find  myself  at  last  en- 
gaged in  building  up  an  entirely  new  type  of  museum. 
There  will  be  many  objects  displayed  beside  the  ones  which 
I  have  indicated.  I  believe  that  with  thoughtful  labeling 
some  zoology,  some  history,  some  folklore,  and  some  poetry 
may  be  taught  in  a  very  attractive  way.  And  I  wish  we 
could  find  a  good  name  for  our  innovation.  I  can  think 
only  of  "Museum  of  Ethnozoology,"  which  sounds  utterly 
loathsome. 


CHAPTER  XVI 


Those  who  Help 


J 


UST  as  I  have  had  great  good  fortune  in  the  support 
given  me  by  my  colleagues  in  the  Museum,  so  I  have  been 
aided  in  many  unexpected  ways  by  natives  of  all  sorts  in 
the  field.  When  Rosamond  and  I  landed  in  Singapore,  we 
had  a  letter  of  introduction  from  Dr.  George  Lincoln 
Goodale  of  Harvard  to  Dr.  Wilham  H.  Ridley,  Director 
of  the  Botanic  Garden.  Ridley  was  very  kind  and  friendly 
and  helped  us  to  find  Ah  Woo,  a  tall  and  stately  Chinese 
boy  who  had  been  a  mess  servant  at  the  mihtary  barracks 
at  Tanglin.  Ah  Woo's  queue  was  a  joy  to  behold.  Long 
and  thick  and  black  as  a  raven's  wing,  pieced  out  with  a 
sort  of  a  whiplash  of  red  silk,  it  extended  to  his  heels. 
When  he  was  at  work  it  was  cunningly  coiled  on  top  of 
his  head,  to  be  pushed  off  to  a  hanging  position  if  one  of 
us  approached  him,  because  to  speak  to  a  superior  with 
one's  queue  coiled  up  was  extremely  impoHte. 

Ah  Woo  traveled  with  us  and  only  left  us  to  return 
home  when  we  left  Peking  for  Japan.  He  became  a  superb 
butterfly  collector  and  was  perfectly  faithful  and  loyal, 
although  he  never  really  liked  to  take  orders  from  my 
wife.  He  was  so  loyal  that  it  was  very  dangerous  to  admire 
anything  in  the  museum  at  Buitenzorg,  because  the  object 
was  likely  to  be  missing  in  the  museum  and  to  turn  up 
presently  in  our  lodgings.  He  was  a  slightly  bloodthirsty 
rascal  and  if  there  was  a  tree  kangaroo  or  some  other  animal 


182  Naturalist  at  Large 

to  be  put  to  death,  that  its  skin  and  skeleton  might  be  pre- 
served, Ah  Woo  always  begged  for  the  chance  to  perform. 

He  nearly  got  us  into  trouble  one  day  at  some  small  town 
in  New  Guinea,  where  one  of  the  natives  had  just  died. 
We  of  course  knew  nothing  about  this,  our  interest  being 
centered  in  some  carved  wooden  drums  which  we  bought 
for  the  Peabody  Museum.  Getting  into  one  of  the  big  out- 
rigger canoes  to  carry  the  objects  out  to  our  ship,  Ah  W^oo 
began  a  joyous  tattoo.  Everything  changed  in  the  flashing 
of  an  eye.  Angry  Papuans  swarmed  from  every  house,  and 
it  was  not  long  before  we  learned  that  you  must  not  beat 
drums  in  the  hearing  of  their  dead.  Souls  might  be  called 
back  from  their  wanderings. 

Indit  and  Bandoung  came  to  us  through  the  good  offices 
of  Dr.  Treub.  They  were  mild,  gentle,  friendly  Javanese. 
They  had  been  naturalists'  assistants  on  board  the  Dutch 
exploring  ship  Siboga  and  literally  knew  almost  every  nook 
and  cranny  of  the  Indies.  They  made  very  passable  bird 
and  mammal  skins,  although  we  were  in  such  a  rush  col- 
lecting everything  —  reptiles,  amphibians,  insects,  and  ma- 
rine invertebrates  —  that  they  never  had  a  chance  to  do 
their  best  work.  They  were  patient  beyond  belief,  and 
when  I  left  Java  one  of  them  wrote  me  a  most  charming 
and  touching  letter  in  Malay,  in  the  Dutch  transliteration, 
perfectly  spelled  and  like  copperplate.  These  two  "boys" 
were  nature's  gentlemen. 

As  I  look  back  over  the  many  years  when  I  used  to  go 
bug  hunting,  an  innumerable  pageant  of  kindly  compan- 
ions passes  before  my  eyes.  I  think  particularly  of  Juicio 
and  Churima.  These  were  probably  not  their  right  names, 


The  Hunter  home  from  the  kill.  Churima  rests  after  brino-ino- 

in  a  peccary  to  camp 


~*>- 


»  .  .■»-  ^"f 


The  author  and  Juicio,  the  chief  of  all  the  Chokoi  Indians 
with  whom  we  came  in  contact 

It  is  a  pity  the  facial  painting  ivitl?  red  anotto  juice  does  not 
shoiv  in  either  photograph 


Tlwse  Who  Help  183 

for  primitive  Indians  don't  like  to  give  away  their  names 
any  more  than  they  do  nail  parings  or  bits  of  hair,  which 
might  be  used  to  bewitch  them.  Dr.  Alfaro,  a  high  official 
of  the  Panamanian  Government,  went  to  Darien  in  1922  in 
a  schooner  which  he  chartered,  to  adjudicate  a  disputed 
boundary  between  the  claims  of  two  oil  companies.  He 
offered  us  a  ride.  Winthrop  Brooks  and  I  were  dumped, 
with  our  considerable  gear,  at  a  little  village  called  Boca 
de  Sabalo,  at  the  head  of  navigation  on  the  Sambu  River. 
We  went  ashore,  found  a  vacant  palm-thatched  hut  with 
a  pole  floor,  and  hired  it  for  a  few  cents.  We  laid  down 
our  floor  cloth  and  set  up  our  mosquito  bars,  for  the  place 
was  a  hotbed  of  malaria. 

We  had  been  advised  in  Panama  by  a  friend  in  the 
Survey  Department,  Major  Omer  Malsbury,  to  ask  for 
Juicio,  who  stood  high  in  the  councils  of  the  Chokoi  In- 
dians. These  Indians  lived  in  the  forests  of  this  section  of 
Panama  and  the  adjacent  portion  of  Colombia.  The  popu- 
lation of  our  little  village  was  of  mixed  Indian  and  Negro 
blood,  but  they  traded  with  the  Indians  who  lived  farther 
back  in  the  woods.  Next  day  Juicio  appeared  and  Churima, 
and  a  number  of  others  of  less  import,  in  a  band.  We  took 
to  each  other  at  once.  Juicio  wore  his  hair  in  a  long,  straight 
black  mane,  with  an  orchid  stuck  over  his  ear  and  his  face 
painted  dizzily  with  the  red  derived  from  anotto.  We 
explained  what  we  wanted  and  he  advised  us  where  to 
camp. 

We  spent  some  time  in  Darien,  moving  our  camp  every 
seventh  day  and  pitching  our  tents  well  away  from  any 
permanent  Indian  habitation.  In  this  way  even  if  we  in- 
fected the  local  mosquitoes,  for  probably  most  of  our 


184  Naturalist  at  Large 

camp  followers  were  carriers  of  malaria,  we  kept  one  jump 
ahead  of  infection  since  it  takes  eight  days  for  the 
mosquitoes  to  become  vectors.  Before  long,  a  number  of 
our  Indians,  including  Churima,  sent  for  their  wives.  This 
is  a  sign  that  one  has  won  their  complete  confidence.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  they  rather  like  Americans  and  distinctly 
dislike  Spanish-speaking  people,  who  were,  and  I  suspect 
possibly  are  still,  inclined  to  be  afraid  of  them,  or  at  least 
to  patronize  them.  We  possessed  such  mysteries  as  desic- 
cated vegetables  and  dried  soups,  so  that  every  meal  was 
an  adventure  to  the  Indians,  and  they  greatly  appreciated 
the  beads  and  other  trinkets  which  we  brought  with  us. 

Mrs.  Churima,  as  we  called  her,  was  a  sleek,  buxom 
damsel  of  tender  years,  very  pretty,  with  a  tiny  baby 
slung  in  her  bark-cloth  scarf.  She  had  a  short  skirt  of  trade 
cotton,  I  suspect  a  flour  sack,  and  was  industrious  beyond 
belief.  She  rolled  stones  in  search  of  frogs  and  lizards  while 
the  baby  dozed.  I  never  heard  it  cry,  and  never  saw  her 
put  it  down,  even  when  she  was  hanging  over  the  fire 
cooking. 

Darien  is  warm  and  moist  and  we  were  there  in  the 
spring,  when  it  was  raining  a  good  deal.  I  am  pretty  heavy 
and  I  remember  a  number  of  occasions  when  my  Gold 
Medal  cot  sank  down  so  that  before  morning  I  was  in  a 
puddle  of  water  well  tinged  with  humic  acid,  which  seeped 
up  through  the  canvas  of  the  cot  and  greatly  irritated  my 
prickly  heat.  We  got  nearly  a  thousand  birds,  a  number 
of  them  new,  quite  a  lot  of  mammals,  including  a  new 
arboreal  mouse,  and  a  wonderful  new  genus  of  lizards.  We 
considered  ourselves  richly  rewarded. 

That  mouse  was  a  veritable  gem  among  mice,  a  lovely 


Those  Who  Help  185 

little  creature;  the  richest  golden  brown  above  and  pearly 
white  beneath,  the  line  of  demarcation  between  the  two 
colors  being  sharply  drawn.  It  fell  to  the  ground  from  a 
tangle  of  vines  pulled  out  of  a  tree  to  get  a  monkey  which 
had  been  shot  and  which  had  lodged  among  the  branches. 
Now  this  little  mouse,  which  is  evidently  an  arboreal 
species,  was  dazed  when  it  landed  and  we  caught  it  easily 
with  our  hands.  We  never  saw  anything  like  it  again.  It 
was  not  only  a  new  species,  but  a  genus  new  to  Central 
America.  Its  nearest  ally  comes  from  Ecuador,  and  when 
Dr.  Allen  and  I  described  it  we  called  it  Oecomys  trabeatus, 
the  adjective  signifying  in  Latin  "of  regal  dress." 

The  lizard  was  really  something  to  brag  about.  I  named 
him  Diaphoranolis  brooksi.  Some  of  our  Indians  cut  down 
a  tree  of  a  species  that  looks  a  good  deal  like  a  poplar  and 
grows  sparingly  throughout  the  Darien  region.  It  burns 
green  with  a  good  hot  fire,  although  there  is  nothing  which 
looks  Hke  rosin  or  pitch  in  it  to  explain  its  inflammabiHty. 
This  lizard,  which  fell  out  of  the  tree,  was  also  an  arboreal 
form,  related,  but  not  very  closely,  to  the  "chameleon"  of 
our  Southern  states.  In  other  words,  naturalists  would  call 
it  an  anoline  lizard.  It  was  pallid  white,  with  many  black 
markings  sharply  defined.  The  pendulous  dewlap,  which 
in  this  case  was  not  extensible  as  it  is  so  often,  was  not 
decorated  with  flash  markinfjs.  The  head  and  the  neck  and 
the  dewlap  thus  were  all  similarly  marked  with  a  network 
of  coarse  black  lines.  There  were  two  black  saddles  on  the 
back  and  nine  black  rings  on  the  tail.  The  most  interesting 
feature  of  all  was  the  fact  that  the  limbs  and  the  digits  bore 
many  pairs  of  sharply  defined  black  lines  occurring  as  rings, 
which,  however,  did  not  quite  meet  on  the  inner  surface. 


186  Naturalist  at  Large 

Thus  the  little  lizard  looked  as  if  it  wore  old-fashioned  lace 
mitts.  I  never  saw  anything  like  it.  At  the  risk  of  being 
prolix,  I  quote  from  my  notes:  — 

The  region  is  one  of  high,  damp,  humid  forest, 
gloomy  and  stifling  except  where  some  watercourse 
cuts  through  the  wooded  lowlands,  letting  in  the  sun- 
light. Decay  of  fallen  wood  and  leaves  is  very  rapid 
and  the  dark  forest  floor  is  sodden  and  slippery.  In 
general,  reptiles  were  surprisingly  rare,  and  often  a  day 
would  pass  when  none  of  us  would  see  a  lizard,  unless 
when  coming  to  the  shore  of  some  small  stream  the 
bipedal  basilisks  would  scurry  away.  The  young  far 
outnumber  the  adults  and  all  are  well  able  to  run  with 
equal  ease  over  land  or  the  face  of  the  water.  While 
they  are  running  over  either  surface  the  body  is  held 
almost  upright,  the  tail  is  raised  as  a  balance,  and  the 
fore  limbs  are  tightly  pressed  to  the  sides.  They  move 
and  stop  with  a  speed  and  precision  which  seems 
mechanical  rather  than  animate.  The  paucity  of  adults 
and  the  shyness  of  both  young  and  old  bespeak  abun- 
dant enemies,  but  of  what  nature  we  were  never  able 
to  learn. 

One  afternoon  an  Indian  who  had  been  gathering  fire- 
wood came  in  carrying  a  small  lizard,  and  we  then  saw 
for  the  first  time  the  young  of  Diploglossiis  7;wnotropis, 
already  known  from  Costa  Rica  and  Colombia.  This  little 
creature,  about  seven  inches  long,  was  so  gorgeously  col- 
ored while  alive  and  so  different  from  the  preserved  exam- 
ples that  my  field  notes  are  again  worth  quoting:  "This 
specimen,  seven  inches  long,  has  a  gray-green  head,  bril- 


Those  Who  Help  187 

liant  carmine  sides  covered  with  anastomosing  black  lines; 
belly  yellowish;  back  and  tail  black  with  beautiful  narrow 
blue-gray,  almost  mauve  crossbars."  I  have  never  seen  such 
a  gaudy  little  critter  except  my  Diploglossus  resplendens 
from  Bolivia. 

A  few  days  after  our  Upper  Jesusito  camp  was  made 
we  began  to  fell  trees  to  let  in  sunlight  and  breeze.  As  it 
turned  out,  there  was  no  breeze  and  the  sun  was  almost 
constantly  obscured  by  rain  clouds.  One  tree  came  down 
with  a  crash  and  brought  with  it  a  living  and  uninjured 
Corythophanes  cristatus.  The  interesting  point  in  connec- 
tion with  this  capture  was  that  we  kept  the  lizard  alive 
long  enough  to  find  that  its  actions  were  singularly 
chameleonlike. 

It  was  sluggish  and  deliberate  in  its  movements,  and  when 
angered  it  reared  upright,  flattened  its  body  vertically,  and 
bent  down  its  head.  Its  mouth  meanwhile  was  opened 
widely  in  a  way  that  recalled  at  once  captive  and  angry 
African  chameleons.  That  the  very  peculiar  superficial 
similarity  of  appearance  should  be  accompanied  by  such 
similar  sluggish  movements  and  curious  attitudes  is  most 
noteworthy  and  almost  incredible  when  the  protean  zo- 
ologic  gap  between  the  two  genera  is  considered. 

In  a  few  places  where  the  forest  roof  leaked  spots  of 
sunlight  the  ground  dried  out  and  the  great,  curly,  new- 
fallen  leaves  made  noisy  walking.  In  these  little  dried-out 
spaces  we  found  some  tiny  lizards.  They  crept  swiftly  and 
stealthily  over  the  big  dead  leaves,  and  when  the  sun  was 
hidden,  as  it  often  was  because  of  the  frequent  showers, 
these  little  lizards  hid  at  once,  to  reappear  when  their 
moldy  abode  became  dry  again.  They  were  not  easy  to 


188  Naturalist  at  Large 

catch,  and  even  when  caught  a  decent  specimen  was  by 
no  means  assured,  for  their  skin  tore  like  wet  tissue  paper 
and  their  struggles  usually  left  them  sadly  unfrocked. 

These,  like  other  slim-toed  Gekkos  or  Eublepharids,  as 
they  once  were  called,  are  far  more  agile  than  their  allies 
with  dilated  digits  —  more  alert  and  less  deliberate  in  their 
movements.  The  species  proved  to  be  the  rare  and  Httle 
known  Lathrogecko  sanctae-martae  Ruthven. 

At  the  end  of  our  stay  in  the  Sapo  Mountains  a  message 
came  that  my  daughter,  Mary  B.,  had  been  operated  on 
for  a  tracheotomy  and  was  not  expected  to  live.  A  tiny 
launch,  in  bad  condition  and  belonging  to  the  schoolmaster, 
was  the  only  transportation  to  be  found.  Into  this  we  piled 
our  precious  gear,  which  filled  it  completely  except  for  a 
little  space  for  the  engineer  and  for  the  steersman  for'ard, 
while  we  stood  on  the  tiny  deck  aft,  with  our  elbows 
resting  on  the  canopy  top,  and  here  we  dozed,  taking  turns 
at  watching  one  another  so  that  neither  of  us  fell  over- 
board, for  about  thirty  hours.  Once  our  engine  went  dead 
and  we  drifted  out  of  sight  of  land  and  were  unutterably 
pleased  to  hear  it  start  sputtering  again. 

At  long  last  the  flashes  of  sunhght  reflected  by  the  pearl 
oyster  shells  embedded  in  the  stucco  of  the  cathedral  tow- 
ers of  Panama  told  us  we  were  nearing  our  destination.  And 
when  we  learned  at  the  Legation  that  Mary  B.  was  well 
and  had  been  for  weeks,  I  leave  it  to  your  imagination  to 
guess  how  much  champagne  we  consumed.  Before  this 
process  began,  be  it  said,  I  walked  up  to  the  desk  of  the 
Tivoli  Hotel  to  sign  for  a  room  and  the  clerk  never  even 
recognized  me,  although  we  had  known  one  another  for 


Those  Who  Help  189 

years.  We  were  a  couple  of  tired  and  gaunt-looking  shad- 
ows, but  supremely  happy. 

Years  later  I  went  back  to  Darien  with  a  party  of 
friends.  We  chartered  a  terrible  old  hooker  called  the 
Augusta  Victoria.  After  we  appraised  the  rat  bites  and 
insect  bites  incurred  during  the  voyage,  we  changed  her 
name  to  the  Ajigustia.  Things  had  changed  when  we  got 
to  Garachine.  One  of  the  big  oil  companies  was  drilling 
on  a  considerable  scale  and  a  lot  of  rather  rough  diamonds 
from  Texas  and  Oklahoma  dwelt  in  well-screened  houses 
near  where  once  we  had  camped.  A  muddy  track  ran  in- 
land from  the  "port,"  and  a  Ford  truck  drove  us  through 
the  forest  to  one  of  the  camps  for  luncheon. 

I  was  sitting  on  the  back  of  the  truck  with  Ned  Ham- 
mond and  Frank  Hunnewell,  when  whom  should  I  spy 
but  Juicio.  I  stopped  the  truck.  Juicio  stepped  forward 
with  that  entirely  self-possessed  manner  which  is  the  in- 
imitable attribute  of  the  American  Indian  everywhere, 
came  up  to  me,  put  his  arms  around  my  neck,  patted  me 
on  the  back,  and  said,  '''Que  hay,  vie  jo?''''  (How  are  you, 
old  man?)  Then  he  went  on  to  tell  me  how  times  had 
changed  and  how  he  and  his  people  loathed  the  Americans 
who  had  settled  on  their  lands. 

Some  of  the  drillers,  however,  had  seen  the  little  drama 
of  our  meeting  and  were  unbelievably  surprised.  One  of 
them  said,  "We  can't  buy  fresh  meat  for  love  or  money 
from  those  Indians."  I  said,  "What  do  you  want?"  "Veni- 
son," he  replied.  "I  will  see  what  I  can  do."  Juicio  and  a 
number  of  his  friends  had  gathered,  squatting  at  the  foot 
of  a  gigantic  quipo  tree,  and  I  walked  over  and  joined  the 
group.  I  asked  them  if  they  would  sell  me  some  deer  meat. 


190  Naturalist  at  Large 

They  said,  "Certainly.  We  have  a  deer  which  we  killed 
this  morning  hidden  within  a  hundred  yards  of  where  we 
are  now,"  I  told  Juicio  to  give  it  to  me  for  old  times'  sake. 
Within  ten  minutes  he  turned  up  with  a  brocket,  dressed 
and  with  the  head  cut  off.  I  gave  the  little  deer  to  the 
drillers  and  they  certainly  thought  that  we  were  magicians. 

In  Darien  Brooks  and  I  suffered  several  times  from  find- 
ing the  larvae  of  a  botfly  in  our  skin.  Curiously  enough 
the  eggs  seemed  to  be  laid  usually  between  our  shoulder 
blades  in  a  particularly  difficult  place  to  scratch.  The  larvae 
grew  fast  and  caused  great  discomfort,  and  being  beset 
with  sharp,  spiny  hairs  they  cannot  be  gotten  out  by  or- 
dinary pinching  and  squeezing.  We  knew  from  the  natives 
that  they  could  be  narcotized  by  tobacco  juice  and  we 
chewed  up  pieces  of  cigars,  rubbed  the  tobacco  juice  on 
the  area,  and  when  we  ceased  to  feel  the  larvae  wiggling 
under  our  skin  we  found  that  they  were  stupefied  by  the 
nicotine  and  could  then  be  popped  out. 

The  grubs  of  this  botfly  were  relatively  few  and  far 
between  until  years  later  a  lot  of  infested  cattle  were 
brought  into  the  Canal  Zone  pastures  from  the  Orinoco 
River  district  in  Venezuela.  I  often  saw  these  in  the  pastures 
near  Summit  in  Panama.  The  flies  which  they  brought  in 
with  them  multiplied  until  the  cattle  became  a  fearsome 
sight,  covered  with  festering,  running  sores  so  that  they 
became  thin  and  poor  from  the  pain  created  by  the  wab- 
bles, and  their  skins  were  worthless  when  they  were 
slaughtered. 

I  didn't  learn  until  some  years  afterwards  the  curious 
life  history  of  this  horrid  pest.  The  fly  itself,  Dennatobia 


Those  Who  Help  191 

hominis,  apparently  does  not  lay  its  eggs  directly  on  its 
host  but  captures  other  flies,  usually  of  the  genus  Limno- 
phora,  or  mosquitoes,  and  lays  its  eggs  upon  them,  releas- 
ing them  immediately.  These  then  hght  upon  man  or  beast 
and  the  egg,  adhering  to  the  skin  of  the  host,  hatches  at 
once  and  the  larva  quickly  dives  beneath  the  hide  of  its 
victim.  The  most  complete  account  has  been  given  by  my 
friend  Lawrence  Dunn,  a  medical  entomologist  in  the 
Gorgas  Memorial  Laboratory  in  Panama.  Seated  at  the 
edge  of  a  small  stream  near  Summit  in  October  1929,  he 
was  infested  by  six  of  these  larvae,  two  on  each  forearm 
and  two  on  his  right  leg.  He  recognized  at  once  that  here 
was  an  opportunity  to  study  the  emergence  of  these  crea- 
tures in  great  detail.  He  returned  to  the  laboratory  and  in 
spite  of  the  most  exquisite  torture  and  the  revolting  fetid 
discharge  from  the  wounds  as  the  larvae  increased  in  size, 
he  patiently  waited  no  less  than  fifty  days  until  the  crea- 
tures finally  emerged.  They  weighed  each  about  0.725 
gram  and  were  each  about  2  5  millimeters  long  and  1 1  mil- 
limeters in  diameter.  His  account  of  the  final  stages  is 
worth  quoting,  for  while  innumerable  travelers  have  suf- 
fered from  these  beasts,  never  before  has  the  exact  time 
between  the  laying  of  the  egg  and  the  emergence  of  the 
larva  been  made  known.  After  they  dropped  from  his  skin 
Dunn  placed  these  larva  in  damp  sand  and  twenty-five 
days  later  the  adult  flies  appeared. 

Brooks  and  I  never  were  infested  more  than  a  few  days 
before  we  got  rid  of  the  beasts.  Dunn's  incredible  patience 
and  penetrating  observations  mark  him  as  a  pioneer  with 
the  spirit  of  a  born  investigator. 


192  Naturalist  at  Large 

November  27.  Larvae  Nos.  i  and  3  were  quiet  and 
gave  very  little  trouble  during  the  night,  but  this 
morning  they  became  active  and  protruded  so  far  that 
I  thought  they  were  about  to  emerge.  No.  3  con- 
tinued more  or  less  movement  during  the  early  morn- 
ing and  the  dressing  was  removed  several  times  to  see 
what  was  taking  place.  At  each  time  the  larva  was 
partly  out  of  the  hole,  but  it  always  withdrew  again 
after  coming  out  about  so  far.  At  10  a.m.  a  movement 
was  felt  on  my  skin  at  the  lesion  and  upon  examination 
the  larva  was  found  to  be  coming  out.  It  appeared  to 
be  doing  very  little  struggling,  yet  it  slowly  came  from 
the  hole  and  dropped  over  on  my  arm. 

I  may  add  that  I  have  never  yet  seen  a  howler  monkey 
that  was  not  infested  by  these  botflies,  nor  have  I  ever  seen 
a  marmoset  or  other  species  of  monkey  that  was.  The 
howlers  evidently  do  not  know  how  to  get  rid  of  them 
and  I  have,  on  two  occasions  at  least,  found  a  howler 
monkey  that  had  fallen  in  a  dying  condition  to  the  forest 
floor,  evidently  seriously  weakened  by  a  heavy  infesta- 
tion of  these  awful  fly  larvae. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

Panama 


I 


THINK  nine  friends  out  of  ten,  if  asked  to  speculate 
on  the  best  job  I  had  ever  done  in  my  life,  would  agree 
that  the  help  I  was  able  to  give  the  Barro  Colorado  Island 
Laboratory  ranked  first. 

The  story  is  not  without  drama.  It  began  in  a  drab,  bick- 
ering meeting  of  scientists  in  Washington,  and  was  fol- 
lowed by  the  organization  of  an  "Institute"  which  existed 
only  on  paper  and  which  apparently  was  unlikely  ever  to 
serve  a  useful  purpose.  Then,  with  the  flooding  of  Gatun 
Lake  in  Panama,  came  the  realization  that  an  island  was 
created  out  of  what  had  once  been  a  tropical  hilltop.  James 
Zetek,  Richard  Strong,  and  William  Morton  Wheeler  per- 
suaded Governor  Morrow  to  set  the  island  aside  for  scien- 
tific purposes,  and  thus  in  1923  imaginations  began  to  kin- 
dle. This  letter  of  Dr.  Wheeler's  tells  its  own  story:  — 

Washington,  D.  C. 
July  7,  192s 
My  dear  Fairchild:  — 

I  have  just  returned  from  Woods  Hole  where  I  had 
a  long  talk  with  Dr.  Schramm  in  regard  to  the  Barro 
Colorado  Laboratory.  On  my  return  to  Boston  I  also 
talked  over  the  matter  with  Dr.  Barbour.  Both  of  these 
gentlemen  feel,  and  I  heartily  agree  with  them,  that  it 
would  be  advisable  for  the  Tropical  Plant  Research 


194  Naturalist  at  Large 

Foundation  to  incorporate  and  take  this  laboratory 
under  its  wing  as  one  of  the  places  in  which  researches 
in  tropical  botany  and  zoology  could  be  carried  on. 
We  also  feel  strongly  that  you  ought  to  take  over  the 
supervision  of  this  laboratory  and  probably  other  trop- 
ical laboratories,  such  as  the  new  marine  laboratory 
which  President  Porras  is  founding  in  Panama  City, 
and  let  us  help  you  in  developing  them.  .  .  . 

I  take  it  that  students  of  plant  diseases  and  the  eco- 
nomic entomologists  would  be  glad  to  have  a  num- 
ber of  stations  in  which  they  could  carry  on  investiga- 
tions under  different  conditions  in  the  American  trop- 
ics. The  zoologists  have  usually  taken  the  lead  in  the 
development  of  marine  stations  but  have  always  made 
room  for  the  botanists  who  desire  to  carry  on  inves- 
tigations in  these  institutions.  Since  botany  and  zool- 
ogy can  no  longer  be  separated,  I  believe  it  would  be 
admirable  if  the  botanists  could  take  these  various 
tropical  laboratories  under  their  wings  and  let  the 
zoologists  come  in  to  help  them.  This  seems  to  me  to 
be  the  more  proper  because  the  plant  life  of  the  tropics 
is  such  a  tremendous  and  basic  affair  and  so  essential 
to  the  development  of  all  animal  life  in  those  re- 
gions. .  .  . 

I  do  hope  that  you  will  think  favorably  of  this  mat- 
ter, which  I  should  like  very  much  to  present  to  you  in 
greater  detail.  This  would  be  best  accomplished  in 
conversation.  I  am  so  glad  to  learn  that  you  are  en- 
thusiastic about  the  Barro  Colorado  proposition.  We 
can  get  Mr.  Zetek  to  look  after  the  laboratory  when 
no  investigators  are  there.  I  contemplate  going  to  Pan- 


.'^ 


^-'■-c. 


Plioto  by   F.    jr.   Hiiiiiic-ccll 

The  author  with  three  Indians  near 
Garachinc,  western  Panama,    1922 


Photo  bv  James  Zctek 


The  Laboratory  at  Barro  Colorado  Island 

To  the  kit  of  the  Diabi  building  vtay  be  seen  the  roof  of  the  author's  little  cabin. 

Directly  behind  it  and  a  little  farther  np  the  hill  is  Frank  Chapman  s  house.  Ja7/ies 

Zetek's  is  to  the  right  and  shortly  below  the  main  building 


Panama  195 

ama  during  the  summer  of  1924  with  one  or  two  of 
my  students,  and  was  delighted  to  hear  that  you  are 
thinking  of  being  there  with  your  son.  Dr.  Barbour 
and  I  have  arranged  with  Zetek  to  have  one  of  the 
Canal  Zone  buildings  taken  down  and  put  up  on  the 
island,  so  that  probably  within  a  few  months  the  sta- 
tion will  be  open  for  work.  Even  at  the  present  time 
Mr.  Shannon  of  the  Bureau  of  Entomology  in  Wash- 
ington is  living  in  a  shack  on  the  island  and  doing 
work  on  mosquitoes  for  Dr.  Dyar.  We  may  say  that 
the  laboratory  is  actually  operating.  It  is  now  up  to 
you  and  the  Tropical  Plant  Research  Foundation  to 
give  it  a  good  boost. 

With  kindest  greetings  to  yourself  and  Mrs.  Fair- 
child,  I  remain 

Yours  sincerely, 

W.  M.  Wheeler 

The  fact  that  Wheeler  planned  to  be  in  Panama  the  sum- 
mer of  1924  meant  that,  if  any  building  was  to  be  done, 
then  was  the  time.  So  James  Zetek  and  I  put  our  heads 
together.  The  idea  that  this  marvelous  stand  of  virgin 
forest,  nearly  eight  square  miles  in  area,  might  be  made 
permanently  available  for  biological  studies  gave  impetus 
to  us  both. 

There  was  no  appropriation,  but  gifts  of  cash  came  in 
from  David  Fairchild,  Barbour  Lathrop,  and  others.  For 
my  part,  the  building  was  made  possible  by  the  fact  that 
I  was  particularly  flush  in  1923.  In  those  days,  if  you  were 
willing  to  speculate  you  could  make  money,  and  I  had 
quite  a  lot  on  hand  at  the  time  —  enough  to  buy  out  the 


196  Naturalist  at  Large 

settlers  who  had  homesteaded  and  started  to  grow  bananas 
on  the  island,  and  also  to  put  up  the  buildings,  lay  a  track, 
and  set  up  a  hoisting  engine  to  carry  supplies  up  the  362 
steps  from  the  lake  shore  to  the  Laboratory  at  the  crest. 
A  tremendous  amount  of  credit  goes  to  Zetek  for  his  in- 
geniousness  and  foresight.  He  and  I  bought  an  amount  of 
material  from  the  Panama  Canal's  obsolete  stores.  The  beg- 
ging and  borrowing  we  did  from  the  Army  and  Navy  as 
well  as  the  Canal  officials  —  borrowing  especially  in  the 
shape  of  brains  —  put  us  in  debt  to  many  people. 

The  question  in  the  beginning  was  how  we  were  to  re- 
ceive the  Federal  recognition  which  was  necessary  if  we 
were  to  operate  efficiently  in  the  Canal  Zone.  Someone 
remembered  the  paper  "Institute  for  Research  in  Tropical 
America,"  and  the  Barro  Colorado  Island  Laboratory  was 
committed  to  its  care.  From  then  on,  the  annual  reports 
were  made  to  and  circulated  by  the  National  Research 
Council,  and  to  all  intents  and  purposes  the  Laboratory  was 
the  Institute. 

This  arrangement  made  it  possible  for  us  to  give  visiting 
scientists  commissary  privileges,  hospital  facilities,  railroad 
passes,  free  entry  through  the  customs,  and  the  right  of  resi- 
dence in  the  Canal  Zone.  It  also  made  possible  the  purchase 
of  ice  and  all  other  supplies  and  their  delivery  at  the  Frijoles 
Station  of  the  Panama  Railroad  by  the  Commissary  De- 
partment of  the  Panama  Canal.  If  it  had  not  been  possible 
to  devise  this  quick  tie-up,  the  whole  development  of  the 
Laboratory  would  have  been  long  delayed. 

The  Laboratory  and  its  work  have  now  become  widely 
known.  Thousands  of  people  have  read  My  Tropical  Air 


Photo  by   T.   Barbour 

One  of  the  giant  Bombacopsis  on  Barro  Colorado  Island 


Shore-line  vegetation  at  Barro  Colorado  Island 


Panama  197 

Castle  by  Frank  Chapman,  the  great  ornithologist.  My 
pride  in  having  built  the  castle  is  very  deep,  not  only  be- 
cause it  provided  the  setting  for  Chapman's  matchless 
stories,  nor  because  at  least  four  hundred  scientific  papers 
have  been  based  on  studies  made  there,  but  for  an  entirely 
different  reason.  The  building  of  this  Laboratory  has  made 
it  possible  for  the  teacher  of  biology  with  a  small  salary  to 
have  the  thrill  of  Wallace,  Bates,  and  Spruce  when  they 
first  set  foot  in  the  Amazon  jungle. 

Our  incomparable  forest,  within  a  hundred  feet  of  the 
Laboratory  door,  is  as  fine  as  anything  to  be  seen  in  Brazil. 
The  great  espave  trees  tower  up  almost  out  of  gimshot  to 
where  their  side  branches  stretch  out  and  interlace  with 
those  of  other  trees,  each  branch  as  large  as  a  giant  white 
oak  and  covered  with  a  garden  of  ferns,  orchids,  and 
bromeliads.  Near  the  spot  which  I  have  in  mind  there  is  a 
giant  Bombacopsis  tree,  its  trunk  supported  by  natural  fly- 
ing buttresses,  making  stalls  where  one  could  stable  ele- 
phants. 

To  see  these  trees  and  to  walk  our  carefully  marked 
tiails  provide  all  the  illusion  of  exploration,  but  with  this 
great  difference:  we  have  pure  drinking  water.  By  care- 
fully testing  the  blood  of  our  employees,  we  can  keep  ma- 
laria off  the  island  so  that  students  can  walk  our  trails  at 
night  with  a  headlight;  if  one  is  ill,  our  launch  crosses  the 
Canal  in  forty  minutes  to  Frijoles  Station  on  the  Panama 
Railroad;  there  is  a  hospital  car  on  every  train,  and  less 
than  an  hour's  ride  is  Gorgas  Hospital  at  Ancon,  as  fine 
as  any  in  the  world.  Our  establishment  provides  comfort 
huZ  not  luxuries.  Our  food  is  simple,  hence  served  at  a 
small  cost.  A  high-school  teacher  of  biology  who  had 


198  Naturalist  at  Large 

saved  up  $250  before  the  war  could  go  and  live  in  the 
midst  of  the  jungle,  with  monkeys,  parrots  and  toucans, 
trogons,  motmots,  and  innumerable  other  denizens  of  the 
lowland  tropical  rain  forest  easily  observed  on  every  hand. 

Strictly  speaking,  the  Canal  Zone  of  Panama  is  not  a 
possession  of  the  United  States.  It  is,  however,  a  per- 
petual leasehold,  and  differs  from  all  other  American  in- 
terests in  the  tropics  in  that  it  is  on  the  mainland.  There 
are  two  bits  of  mainland  tropical  rain  forest  in  the  posses- 
sion of  the  United  States:  one  is  Barro  Colorado  Island  and 
the  other  is  the  forest  reserve  which  I  persuaded  Governor 
Harry  Burgess  to  set  aside  along  that  stretch  of  the  road 
from  Summit  to  Madden  Dam  which  is  within  the  Canal 
Zone.  The  rest  has  been  cut  down  to  provide  room  for 
cultivation.  The  climate  at  Summit  is  somewhat  drier  than 
it  is  on  the  island,  and  the  two  spots  of  forest  are  quite 
different,  botanically  and  faunally. 

Until  a  year  ago  the  Laboratory  was  supported  by  table 
fees,  small  sums  paid  by  ten  or  a  dozen  institutions  to  en- 
able officers  and  students  serving  them  to  stay  at  the 
Laboratory  at  special  rates.  The  Governor  of  the  Panama 
Canal  allowed  us  railroad  passes,  the  right  to  purchase  at 
the  commissaries,  and  hospital  privileges.  But  a  year  or 
more  ago  the  island  was  taken  over  by  the  Government 
and  renamed  the  Canal  Zone  Biological  Area.  The  Institute 
is  now  an  independent  entity  like  the  National  Academy 
of  Sciences  and  the  Smithsonian  Institution. 

We  are  no  longer  tenants  at  will  who  could  be  ousted 
by  an  unsympathetic  governor,  and  we  have  a  permissive 
appropriation  of  $10,000  a  year  which  Congress  quite 
characteristically  fails  to  appropriate.  Now,  of  course,  the 


Panama  199 

institutions,  being  eager  to  save  a  dollar  wherever  possible, 
have  tried  to  welsh  out  of  paying  their  table  fees  on  the 
ground  that  we  are  on  easy  street  financially.  Just  the  re- 
verse is  true,  and  it  looks  as  if  the  old  familiar  pastime  of 
making  up  deficits  might  continue.  The  island  is  now  gov- 
erned by  a  board  consisting  of  the  Secretaries  of  War,  In- 
terior, and  Agriculture,  and  three  Naturalists,  with  the 
President  of  the  National  Academy  of  Sciences  as  Chair- 
man of  the  Board.  If  it  were  not  for  the  amazing  wizardry 
with  which  Paul  Brockett  weaves  his  way  through  the  in- 
tricate maze  of  Washington  red  tape  and  the  equal  skill 
with  which  James  Zetek  treads  the  same  path  in  the  Canal 
Zone,  my  unpaid  job  as  the  Executive  Officer  of  the  Canal 
Zone  Biological  Area  would  be  a  far  more  arduous  pastime 
than  it  is. 

I  was  in  the  Canal  Zone  frequently  between  19 16  and 
1936  and  was  often  included  when  parties  were  made  up 
to  visit  the  Chillibrillo  Caves  on  the  headwaters  of  the  Httle 
stream  of  the  same  name.  These  caverns  were  the  objective 
of  many  a  pleasant  picnic.  I  went  several  times  with  Meri- 
wether Walker  and  his  wife,  Edith,  when  he  was  Gov- 
ernor of  the  Canal.  We  assembled  at  Gamboa,  took  a  police 
launch,  went  up  the  Chagres  River,  then  the  Chilibre,  and 
so  into  the  Chillibrillo  and  to  the  caves. 

My  hosts  allowed  me  to  wear  old  clothes,  and  I  col- 
lected in  the  caves  while  the  picnic  luncheon  was  being 
prepared.  Of  course  on  these  excursions  I  had  first-class 
electric  lights,  one  on  a  headband  and  one  portable.  The 
unbelievably  large  bat  population  in  these  caves  was  ex- 
traordinary, not  only  for  the  number  of  individuals  but 


200  Naturalist  at  Large 

for  the  tremendous  variety  of  species.  In  fact,  on  every 
visit  I  found  a  bat  or  two  that  had  not  been  taken  pre- 
viously, and  I  suspect  the  same  thing  would  happen  if  I 
returned  there  tomorrow. 

The  caves  were  incredibly  noisome  and  hot,  and  I  was 
certainly  a  mess  at  the  end  of  each  sortie.  I  recall  that  one 
day  I  rode  back  on  top  of  the  launch  because  I  was  in  no 
wise  fit  company  for  the  ladies  inside.  The  Governor  joined 
me  on  the  roof,  and  we  sat  looking  at  the  scene  of  exquisite 
beauty  which  unfolded  itself  as  we  passed  bend  after  bend 
of  the  Chagres  River.  The  little  clearings  were  not  con- 
spicuous, and  great  stretches  of  untouched  tropical  forest 
billowed  away  on  either  hand.  The  guayacan  trees  were 
in  bloom  and  the  whole  scene  looked  as  if  some  giant  had 
passed  over  it  with  an  overflowing  bucket  of  molten  gold, 
big  blobs  representing  giant  forest  trees  and  little  spatters 
the  lesser  trees  poking  their  heads  up  through  the  roof  of 
the  jungle.  This  is  one  of  the  most  spectacular  shows  staged 
by  nature  anywhere  in  the  world.  It  is  a  pity  the  bloom  lasts 
only  a  few  days. 

Looking  out  at  this  scene,  the  Governor  said  to  me,  "If 
only  this  country  wasn't  cursed  with  malaria."  That  re- 
mark set  me  thinking.  There  we  were,  riding  on  the  river 
whose  very  name  is  synonymous  with  pestilence.  I  sup- 
pose there  are  millions  of  people  who  have  heard  of 
Chagres  fever  and  who  have  never  heard  of  the  Chagres 
River. 

If  only  malaria  had  not  come  to  America,  how  different 
everything  would  have  been.  Is  it  not  a  fair  assumption 
that  when  Alexander's  army  brought  it  from  India  to 
Greece  the  light  of  Greece  waned?  It  is  not  unreasonable 


Our  tent  (on  the  left)  by  an  almost  dry  stream  in  eastern  Panama 

The  hidhms  viade  its  change  the  location  of  this  cavip  as  they 
feared  a  sudden  "'cresciente'''  at  night 


Churima's  house,  where  we  hung  our  mosquito  bars  on  various 

occasions 


Panama  201 

to  suppose  that  the  same  thing  happened  with  Rome. 
Whether  it  reached  America  with  Columbus  or  not  seems 
very  doubtful.  I  am  not  a  medical  historian,  but  it  is  quite 
obvious  that  Cortez,  equipped  as  he  was  and  with  the 
number  of  followers  that  he  had,  could  never  have  marched 
from  Mexico  City  to  where  Trujillo  in  Honduras  is  now, 
if  malaria  had  stalked  abroad  in  the  land.  No  disease  in  the 
entire  world  causes  so  much  suffering  and  incapacity  as 
does  this  one;  and  for  the  untold  number  with  whom  qui- 
nine does  not  agree,  the  use  of  this  drug,  either  as  a  pro- 
phylactic or  as  a  curative  agent,  means  suffering  almost  as 
bad  as  that  of  the  disease. 

One  dreads  the  temptation  which  some  day  is  going  to 
come  to  many  people  to  motor  over  the  Pan-American 
Highway  when  it  is  completed.  They  little  realize  the 
misery  which  will  be  theirs  from  carelessness  or  lack  of 
knowledge  in  warding  off  this  disease.  It  can  be  done,  but 
it  cannot  be  done  easily. 

Probably  the  fault  is  entirely  mine,  but  the  published 
reasons  that  moved  the  Peabody  Museum  to  excavate  at 
the  Sitio  Conte  in  Code,  Panama,  are  not  correctly  set 
forth  in  the  Memoirs  describing  the  finds.  The  matter  is 
not  important,  but  it  illustrates  in  a  peculiar  degree  how 
chance  governs  all  sorts  of  things  besides  our  digestion.  My 
wife  and  I  were  in  Panama  in  August  1928.  We  were 
house  guests  of  Meriwether  and  Edith  Walker.  I  re- 
member the  question  of  shopping  came  up  one  morning  at 
the  breakfast  table,  and  I  said  to  Rosamond  and  Edith 
that  I  hoped  they  would  stay  out  of  shops  in  the  con- 
gested center  of  Panama   City  —  because   there   was   an 


202  Naturalist  at  Large 

epidemic  of  severe  influenza  running  riot  at  the  time. 

Fortunately  they  paid  no  attention  whatever  to  my  ad- 
vice and,  poking  about,  they  went  into  the  funny  Httle  rat's 
nest  of  a  curio  shop  kept  by  an  old  German  named  Peter 
Hauck.  It  was  the  most  slovenly,  messiest  little  hole  in  the 
wall  that  anyone  ever  saw.  But  Peter  Hauck,  for  all  his 
squalor,  was  a  shrewd,  intelligent  person.  They  bought  a 
few  objects  as  ornaments.  I  recall  an  interesting  little  stone 
figure  which  Rosamond  gave  to  Edith  as  a  memento  of 
our  visit.  At  noontime  I  admired  this  and  asked  where  it  had 
come  from.  I  was  told,  and  Rosamond  added  that  she  had 
seen  an  extraordinary  little  stone  pelican  partially  en- 
sheathed  in  gold  which  looked  utterly  unhke  the  gold  fig- 
ures which  are  frequently  dug  up  in  the  Province  of  Chiri- 
qui  and  are  even  more  frequently  faked  for  sale  to  tourists. 
She  said  that  Hauck  had  a  number  of  other  things  from  the 
same  locality,  but  that  he  would  sell  them  only  to  a  museum 
and  that  he  did  not  want  the  collection  dispersed. 

Well,  I  could  not  wait  to  get  to  Peter  Hauck's  shop  after 
luncheon  was  over.  I  found  that  he  quite  obviously  was 
securing  material  from  a  region  that  promised  to  be  a  rich 
treasury.  I  bought  the  collection  and  had  it  shipped  to 
Cambridge.  My  address  being  given  in  care  of  a  museum, 
he  was  entirely  willing  to  dispose  of  it  at  a  quite  reasonable 
figure. 

When  the  specimens  arrived  and  were  examined,  con- 
siderable correspondence  ensued  with  Mr.  Karl  Curtis,  an 
ardent  amateur  of  archaeology  and  an  old  employe  of  the 
Panama  Canal,  a  warm  and  sterling  friend  of  us  all.  He  it 
was  who  found  that  the  floods  of  1927  had  washed  deeply 
into  the  sides  of  the  river  in  the  pastures  of  Don  Miguel 


Panama  203 

Conte,  near  Penonome  in  the  Province  of  Code.  Dr.  Ed- 
ward Reynolds,  then  Director  of  the  Peabody  Museum 
in  Cambridge,  persuaded  Professor  Tozzer  and  Professor 
Hooton  to  go  to  Panama,  to  visit  the  Conte  family  and  to 
draw  up  a  contract  allowing  the  Peabody  Museum  to  carry 
on  explorations.  These  excavations  produced  vast  stores 
of  pre-Columbian  objects  in  pottery,  stone,  gold,  and  even 
emeralds  —  and  the  whole  discovery  was  the  result  of  not 
taking  my  advice  about  Panama  City  and  the  influenza 
epidemic.  I  may  add,  also,  that  no  one  got  influenza. 

I  wish  I  had  my  daughter  Mary's  ability  to  paint  a  pic- 
ture in  words.  If  I  had,  I  could  make  it  possible  for  you  to 
see  with  me  the  loveHness  of  the  coming  of  day  on  Barro 
Colorado  Island.  I  have  a  mind  to  try.  I  will  assume  that 
you,  my  gentle  reader,  are  another  mere  man,  of  course. 
Otherwise  I  could  hardly  say  what  I  am  going  to  say  with 
propriety.  How  would  you  like  to  come  and  spend  the 
night  with  me?  I  have  a  spare  Gold  Medal  cot  which  can 
be  set  up  in  a  moment,  and  the  Spaniards  taught  us  genera- 
tions ago  that  canvas  drawn  taut  was  the  ideal  substratum 
on  which  to  sleep  in  the  tropics.  Anyone  who  camps  in  the 
North  knows  that  you  get  colder  from  below  and  must 
sleep  on  blankets  more  than  under  blankets.  But  not  down 
here.  You  can  have  a  thin  sheet  to  pull  up  just  before  dawn, 
but  otherwise  we  won't  have  to  bother  about  bedding. 

I  have  insomnia  and  awake  with  ease,  so  that  if  I  hear 
any  footsteps  on  our  roof  I  will  call  you  and  we  will  step 
out  with  my  big  electric  flashlight.  It  is  likely  that  you 
will  get  a  glimpse  of  one  of  our  several  species  of  pretty 
little  opossums,  or  a  night  monkey,  brown  and  furry,  with 


204  Naturalist  at  Large 

the  puckish  little  face  of  a  very  imp.  Of  course  if  it  should 
be  rainy,  you  would  hear  some  interesting  frog  calls,  but 
I  can  promise  you  nothing  in  the  way  of  an  amphibian 
chorus  to  be  compared  with  the  unbelievable  roar  and  din, 
a  veritable  biological  boiler  factory,  which  you  can  hear 
around  the  University  of  Florida  at  Gainesville  —  in  the 
spring  —  and  learn  a  lot  about  if  you  have  Professor  Archie 
Carr  to  identify  the  calls  for  you.  This,  as  I  say,  I  cannot 
promise,  but  you  will  hear  some  frogs  and  toads,  and  in- 
numerable insects.  I  shall  set  the  alarm  clock  for  about  five 
forty-five.  We  are  near  enough  to  the  Equator  so  that 
there  is  only  a  few  minutes'  difference  in  the  length  of  days 
through  the  year  and,  as  you  no  doubt  know,  day  comes 
and  night  falls  quickly  in  the  zone  between  the  Tropic 
of  Capricorn  and  the  Tropic  of  Cancer. 

We  will  assume  now  that  the  alarm  has  rung  and  step 
out  on  our  Httle  screened  porch,  which  presses  directly 
against  the  front  of  the  great  forest.  Sit  down  with  me  in 
your  pajamas,  so  as  not  to  waste  time,  as  the  sky  begins 
to  pale,  just  as  the  first  pair  of  parrots  flies  overhead,  their 
acrimonious  vituperations,  one  to  the  other,  bespeaking 
their  haste  to  reach  some  distant  feeding  tree.  By  great 
good  fortune  a  pair  of  macaws  may  fly  over,  but  they  are 
rare  and  have  almost  disappeared  from  tliis  part  of  Panama. 
If  they  should  pass,  they  will  give  a  demonstration  of  avian 
billingsgate  completely  unrivaled.  If  you  want  to  hear 
paroxysms  of  connubial  discontent  shrieked  out  over  the 
treetops,  listen  now.  It  is  too  early  to  watch  for  the  toucans, 
but  they  will  volplane  over  our  heads  before  long. 

Look  out  and  see  that  great  wliite  balsa-tree  blossom 
tremble.  Its  pallid  chalice  seems  to  tip  sidewise.  As  it  grows 


Panama  205 

a  little  lighter,  you  will  see  a  white-faced  monkey  sipping 
his  eye  opener.  The  great  blossom  contains  rain  water, 
some  nectar,  no  doubt,  the  mixture  generously  spiced  with 
drowned  insects,  so  that  the  draught  is  surely  nourishing. 
He  is  only  one  of  a  dozen  or  more  that  spent  the  night 
roosting  near  by.  A  pair  of  marmosets  bicker  on  a  great 
vine.  Now  it  is  light  enough  for  the  howling  monkeys  high 
overhead  to  open  their  roaring  competition.  Each  one, 
great  and  small,  sounds  certainly  as  if  pre-eminence  in 
roaring  had  suddenly  become  a  most  ardently  desired  at- 
tainment. 

Wild  figs,  so-called  (they  are  not  figs  at  all),  begin  to 
sound  lil<:e  giant  raindrops  hitting  the  jungle  floor.  This 
means  that  the  Pavos  are  up  feeding  in  the  tall  tree  and 
shaking  off  more  fruit  than  they  devour.  These  great  birds, 
locally  called'  turkeys,  are  in  truth  not  distantly  related  to 
those  birds.  Ornithologists  will  recall  them  as  Penelope. 
Now  the  colony  of  oropendulas  awakens,  enormous  orioles, 
their  great  nests  swinging,  not  from  the  breeze,  for  the 
morning  is  dead  still,  but  as  the  birds  hop  in  or  out  and  thus 
set  them  in  motion.  They  keep  up  a  constant  musical  clat- 
ter, quite  like  the  janghng  of  a  peal  of  bells,  and  Panama- 
nians declare  they  are  talking  Chinese.  What  they  do  they 
certainly  do  incessantly. 

Coatis,  their  long  tails  erect  and  curved  and  their  long 
Paul  Pry  noses  sniffing  about  the  lawns,  jump  for  a  cricket 
or  mumble  a  fallen  fig  with  equal  gusto.  As  with  all  the 
tribe  of  the  raccoons  and  bears,  their  appetite  is  as  liberally 
omnivorous  as  my  own.  Perhaps  this  morning,  as  often 
happens,  there  will  be  a  short,  sharp  shower  of  rain  and 
everything  will  become  hushed  and  still,  and  as  the  shower 


206  Naturalist  at  Large 

passes  the  pageant  of  sounds,  if  one  may  use  such  a  simile, 
is  re-enacted  and  you  have  the  fun  of  listening  all  over 
again. 

Nothing  ever  impressed  me  more  than  when  Johnny  Ses- 
sums,  who  was  General  Preston  Brown's  flying  aide,  once 
told  me  that  5000  feet  over  the  island  he  could  see  what 
looked  like  blue  sparks  snapping  against  a  background  of 
green  velvet.  I  knew  at  once  that  it  was  the  sun  striking 
the  wings  of  the  giant  Morpho  butterflies,  the  upper  sur- 
face of  whose  wings  is  a  solid  sheet  of  metallic  azure.  This 
sight  I  have  never  seen,  though  my  daughter  Mary  B.  and 
my  wife  have  flown  with  him  high  enough  to  see  far  out 
into  both  oceans.  But  they  do  not  get  seasick  as  I  do. 

There  are  twenty-five  miles  of  shore  Hne  to  our  six 
square  miles  of  island,  which  shows  that  it  is  deeply  em- 
bayed. The  island  supports  1 800  species  of  flowering  plants, 
about  70  species  of  mammals,  and  something  over  275  spe- 
cies of  birds.  This  is  the  equivalent  of  what  might  be  seen 
in  Massachusetts  in  a  year  of  observation  of  resident  and 
migrant  birds  together,  and  Massachusetts  is  1366  times 
larger  than  Barro  Colorado  Island.  But  these  figures  help 
no  impression  of  the  beauty  of  the  place. 

Probably  few  spots  in  the  world  have  provided  more 
intellectual  thrills  or  satisfied  more  intellectual  curiosity 
than  has  Barro  Colorado  Island.  Every  naturalist,  be  he 
high-school  teacher  or  independent  investigator  or  college 
professor  of  biology,  craves  a  chance  to  see  a  tropical  rain 
forest,  if  only  for  once  in  his  life;  and  many  who  have  had 
their  first  chance  on  Barro  Colorado  Island  have  returned 
there  again  and  again. 


Panama  207 

The  Laboratory  is  now  closed,  maintained  by  a  skeleton 
crew  in  charge  of  Mr.  Zetek.  The  tropical  forest  is  so  in- 
tolerant of  the  invasion  of  its  realms  by  man  that  all  ves- 
tiges of  our  occupation  would  disappear  in  a  short  time  if 
we  did  not  keep  a  crew  there.  Even  our  "graveyard"  would 
soon  disappear.  This  consists  of  stumps  of  wood  prepared 
with  all  sorts  of  materials  supposedly  or  actually  useful  in 
protecting  the  wood  against  the  ravages  of  termites,  the 
greatest  scourge  affecting  wooden  buildings  in  the  tropics. 
These  test  sticks,  planted  in  the  ground  at  exactly  the  same 
depth,  under  the  same  conditions,  and  carefully  watched, 
are  now,  after  fifteen  years  of  Mr.  Zetek's  penetrating  ob- 
servation, beginning  to  produce  information  of  great  value. 

I  don't  know  whether  I  shall  ever  see  Barro  Colorado 
again,  but  I  certainly  hope  that  I  may,  if  only  to  sail  by  it 
through  the  Canal  in  the  month  of  March,  when  the 
guayacan  trees  lift  their  lofty  heads  above  the  forest  top, 
each  as  glittering  as  a  golden  dome,  while  the  purple 
Jacarandas,  the  pale  pink  almendros,  and  the  Palo  Santo 
with  flowers  as  crimson  as  arterial  blood  make  a  scene  of 
incomparable  splendor. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

Scientists  and  Philosophers 


I 


NEVER  could  see  eye  to  eye  with  my  Grandmother 
Barbour  in  her  great  admiration  for  Thoreau.  As  I  said 
in  my  introduction  to  Concord  River  by  William  Brewster, 
I  feel  that  Thoreau's  ego  was  always  too  near  the  surface 
and  he  was  too  constantly  crusading.  He  seems  to  me 
smug  and  self-satisfied,  preening  himself  for  his  "passive 
resistance,"  though  why  one  should  seek  credit  for  not 
paying  one's  taxes  is  hard  to  see.  Civil  disobedience  was  as 
natural  to  Thoreau  as  it  is  to  Gandhi,  and  however  saintly 
the  latter  may  appear  to  his  followers,  to  most  Americans 
in  this  struggle  for  survival  he  cuts  a  slightly  ridiculous 
figure. 

Thoreau  loved  to  philosophize,  and  it  has  always  seemed 
to  me  that  his  natural-history  notes,  though  written  in  a 
charming  English  style,  were  those  of  a  man  with  a  very 
inadequate  background.  WilHam  Brewster,  for  many  years 
the  Curator  of  Birds  at  the  Agassiz  Museum,  was  much 
better,  a  peerless  observer  and  one  not  given  to  morahzing. 

Some  years  ago  my  friend  Lawrence  Henderson  got  all 
tittered  up  about  Pareto.  I  had  my  tongue  in  my  cheek,  but 
finally  consented  to  buy  Pareto's  two  huge  volumes,  Traite 
de  Sociologie  General.  I  simply  could  not  suffer  through 
it.  David  Fairchild  and  others  of  my  friends,  including 
Wheeler,  ate  it  alive,  but  my  poor  mundane  mind  saw 


Scientists  and  Philosophers  209 

nothing  but  the  words.  It  was  said  that  Mussolini  had  been 
considerably  influenced  by  studying  Pareto.  As  I  look  back 
on  it,  it  may  perhaps  be  concluded  that  this  was  not  an 
overwhelming  recommendation  for  the  book.  I  like  to  read 
books  concerning  history,  biography,  travel,  adventure, 
detective  stories,  and  shrewd  observations  concerning  ani- 
mals or  plants.  But  philosophy  is  completely  beyond  my 
ken;  it  not  only  bores  me,  it  irritates  me,  and  after  a  bout 
of  Pareto  I  become  absolutely  unfit  for  human  companion- 
ship. 

The  men  whom  I  have  derived  the  deepest  satisfaction 
from  meeting  and  thinking  about  have  usually  not  been 
thinkers  in  the  strict  sense  of  the  word.  Time  and  again  I 
have  recalled  the  delight  of  meeting  Wilham  H.  Ridley. 
He  was  Director  of  the  Botanic  Garden  at  Singapore  when 
David  Fairchild  and  Barbour  Lathrop  visited  the  Garden  in 
1897.  He  was  still  Director  when  I  presented  my  letter  of 
introduction  to  him  from  Dr.  George  L.  Goodale.  It  was 
Ridley  alone,  among  all  the  directors  of  the  gardens  in 
British  colonies  throughout  the  tropical  world,  who  began 
to  experiment  with  the  rubber  seedlings  distributed  by 
Kew  Gardens  after  the  first  batch  of  seed  was  bootlegged 
out  from  Brazil.  He  studied  the  variation  in  quality  of  the 
latex  in  the  different  trees  and  methods  of  tapping.  Although 
it  was  slow  in  coming  and  the  British  and  Dutch  planters  of 
the  Malayan  region  took  a  lot  of  coaxing,  when  rubber 
culture  once  took  hold  it  went  forward  with  a  rush.  About 
the  time  Brazilian  forest  rubber  reached  $2.10  a  pound, 
plantation  rubber  began  to  appear  on  the  market  and  in  a 
few  years  the  Brazilian  rubber  town  of  Manaos  was  a  de- 
serted city.  Probably  not  one  person  in  a  thousand  has  ever 


210  Naturalist  at  Large 

heard  Ridley's  name,  but  yet  the  development  of  Malayan 
rubber  owes  more  to  him  than  to  any  other  man. 

Chattincr  once  with  Mr.  Lowell  in  the  President's  office 
a  few  years  ago,  after  we  had  been  talking  about  some  of 
the  pecuUarities  of  my  older  colleagues,  I  said  to  him,  "Why 
doesn't  the  present  generation  produce  any  of  the  curious 
figures  that  stalked  across  the  Harvard  stage  a  generation 
ago?"  He  turned  and,  with  his  charming  and  whimsical 
smile,  said,  "Buy  a  mirror." 

While  I  received  my  Bachelor's  and  Master's  degree  at 
the  hands  of  President  EHot,  I  received  my  Doctor's  degree 
the  first  year  that  Mr.  Lowell  presided  at  Commencement. 
I  had  already  become  connected  with  the  Museum  at  Har- 
vard in  a  modest  way,  so  that  I  served  Mr.  Lowell  during 
the  entire  time  of  his  presidency,  a  fact  which  I  look  back 
upon  with  the  greatest  pleasure  and  satisfaction,  for  no  one 
ever  served  a  more  worthy  master. 

I  remember  the  day  before  he  was  to  be  inaugurated. 
We  walked  together  across  the  Yard.  He  stood  for  a 
moment  near  Massachusetts  Hall  and  surveyed  the  sea  of 
seats  which  had  been  set  up  for  the  benefit  of  spectators 
on  the  morrow.  He  remarked,  "It's  hard  for  me  to  believe 
that  so  many  people  should  want  to  come  to  see  that  show 
tomorrow."  I  rephed,  "Mr.  Lowell,  if  there  were  a  gallows 
set  up  in  the  Yard  and  you  were  to  be  hanged  on  it,  there 
would  be  five  times  as  many  people  who  would  want  to  be 
here."  He  replied,  "I  guess  you're  right."  Now  this  is  not 
a  very  touching  story,  but  the  point  is  that  Mr.  Lowell 
was  sufficiently  humble-minded  not  to  take  offense,  to 


Scientists  and  Philosophers  211 

observe  that  I  was  a  bit  of  an  ass,  or  make  any  other  such 
remark,  which  would  have  been  perfectly  justified.  He 
was  a  realist  then,  as  always. 

Professor  Nathaniel  Southgate  Shaler  was  a  curious, 
lovable  figure.  He  offered  a  so-called  research  course  and  I 
happened  to  be  the  only  student  in  it  the  year  of  his  death. 
It  was  during  my  study  with  him  at  his  home  that  he  told 
me  a  memorable  story.  I  wish  I  could  conjure  up  a  picture 
of  our  meeting.  Shaler  was  slender,  all  wire.  He  spoke 
rapidly  and  with  great  precision  of  utterance,  and  from 
time  to  time  he  stroked  his  beard  and  then  ran  his  hand  up 
the  front  of  his  head,  so  that  his  hair  frequently  stood  up  in 
a  way  which  matched  his  beard  quite  strikingly.  His  plan 
was  to  prepare  a  simile  to  present  in  one  of  his  lectures  in 
Geology  4;  he  wished  to  illustrate  the  fact  that  it  was 
fortunate  indeed  that  we  had  the  phenomenon  of  death. 
What,  he  argued,  would  the  earth  be  like  if  every  animal 
that  had  ever  been  born  had  continued  to  live  forever? 
I  allowed  that  it  might  be  difficult  to  make  this  most 
unhappy  possibility  very  vivid.  "Nonsense,"  replied  Shaler, 
"I  have  thought  of  an  example.  Given  a  single  partheno- 
genetic  plant  louse,  one  of  those  little  bugs  which  can  re- 
produce its  kind  without  the  presence  of  the  opposite  sex. 
Now,  if  all  the  progeny  of  a  single  plant  louse  should  live,  I 
have  calculated  that  at  the  end  of  a  year  we  should  be 
faced  with  a  column  of  plant  lice  having  a  diameter 
equivalent  to  the  distance  from  Quincy  to  Brattle  Street 
and  thrusting  itself  upward  through  space  with  three  times 
the  velocity  of  Hght."  Having  made  this  perfectly  astound- 


212  Naturalist  at  Large 

ing  statement,  Shaler  looked  at  me  sharply.  I  said,  "You 
win.  Professor.  You  have  certainly  made  this  as  vivid  as  it 
could  conceivably  be"  —  which  certainly  was  true. 

I  had  a  letter  not  long  ago  from  an  old  friend  who  knew 
that  I  was  writing  some  of  my  recollections.  He  said,  "I 
think  that  a  chapter  would  not  be  amiss  laying  stress  on 
the  importance  of  scientific  education." 

Well,  that's  just  what  I'm  not  going  to  do.  If  there  is 
anything  that  is  being  overstressed  at  the  present  time  it  is 
the  importance  of  scientific  education.  I  should  much 
rather  advise  every  boy  to  prepare  himself  with  all  the 
Latin  and  Greek  which  he  can  pack  in,  round  this  off  with 
good  English  reading  and  a  modern  language  or  two,  and  he 
will  have  the  firm  basis  for  any  education. 

I  think  the  scientist  is  born,  not  made;  I  know  the 
mathematician  is,  and  the  physicist  and  the  chemist  as  well. 
These  sciences  are  so  inherently  unattractive  in  themselves 
and  involve  so  much  drudgery  that  no  one  ever  tackles 
them  seriously  who  is  not  born  with  an  innate  urge  to  study 
them. 

I  entered  Harvard  College,  of  course,  under  the  old 
plan  with  lots  of  separate  examinations  during  several 
consecutive  days.  I  am  happy  to  say  that  I  passed  well  in 
Latin,  Greek,  and  German,  though  I  failed  utterly  in 
physics  — a  condition  which  I  should  still  be  trying  to 
work  off  if  it  had  not  been  for  the  sympathetic  understand- 
ing of  Professor  Wallace  Sabine.  I  remarked  once  to 
Mr.  Lowell  that  I  regretted  never  having  studied  history 
or  government  while  I  was  an  undergraduate.  He  replied 
that  he  could  not  see  why  I  should  feel  that  way  about 


Scientists  and  Philosophers  213 

it  considering  the  variety  of  my  reading  since  I  left  col- 
lege. He  added,  however:  "You  wouldn't  have  made  up 
your  Greek  and  Latin  that  way."  Of  course  he  was  entirely 
correct.  I  think  Latin  and  Greek  have  to  be  drilled  in  as 
the  foundation  on  which  to  build  later  studies  of  foreign 
languages.  Although  I  can't  read  either  of  the  ancient 
tongues  at  all  fluently  now,  they  help  me  make  pleasant 
new  generic  names  like  Hoplophryne  or  Pomatops  or 
Suillomeles. 

During  my  Harvard  years  I  have  been  asked  a  hundred 
times  whether  Louis  or  Alexander  Agassiz  was  the  greater 
man.  The  mere  fact  that  I  am  the  unworthy  occupant  of 
their  chair  does  not  necessarily  make  my  opinion  of  value. 
Nevertheless,  because  I  knew  many  of  their  pupils,  and 
had  the  great  privilege  of  knowing  Alexander  myself,  I 
might  reasonably  be  expected  to  have  formed  an  opinion. 
But  I  was  always  noncommittal  until  one  afternoon  I  had 
a  long  conversation  on  this  subject  with  Mr.  Lowell  just  a 
short  time  after  he  had  resigned  as  President  of  Harvard 
College. 

Mr.  Lowell  argued  in  this  way:  Both  men  had  been  in- 
terested in  geology  at  one  stage  of  their  careers.  Louis  as  a 
young  man  gave  to  the  world  his  immortal  studies  of  glacia- 
tion  with  all  they  impHed.  Glacial  geology  has  now  come 
to  be  a  science  by  itself.  The  effect  of  the  concept  that 
there  was  a  polar  ice  cap  has  had  a  bearing  not  only  on 
modern  interpretations  of  geology  and  oceanography,  but 
on  zoography  and  the  modern  interpretation  of  the  dis- 
tribution of  plants  as  well.  This  work  alone  would  have 
given  Louis  undying  fame.  Alexander's  studies  of  coral 


214  Naturalist  at  Large 

reefs  were  carried  on  later  in  life,  and  resulted  in  the  ac- 
cumulation of  an  enormous  number  of  data  which  have 
been  useful,  but  he  died  without  ever  correlating  and 
synthesizing  his  findings  for  the  benefit  of  others.  And 
therefore,  Mr.  Lowell  concluded,  Louis  was  the  greater 
man. 

Professor  Stanley  Gardiner  conveyed  more  informa- 
tion as  to  the  probable  origin  of  atolls  in  the  little  bulletin 
published  by  the  Museum  in  Cambridge  than  was  con- 
tained in  the  many  memoirs  of  Alexander  Agassiz.  No  doubt 
Mr.  Agassiz's  untimely  death  kept  him  from  completing 
his  work,  but  the  fact  remains  that  he  did  not  finish  it.  Both 
men  were  artists.  Here,  in  my  opinion,  Alexander  un- 
questionably excelled.  Both  did  important  work  in  embry- 
ology, and  here  again  I  think  Alexander's  work  is  superior. 
For  one  reason,  it  was  done  with  more  modern  microscopic 
equipment  than  was  available  when  his  father  did  his  work 
on  the  embryology  of  the  turtles. 

Both  were  really  great  taxonomists.  Louis  Agassiz's 
work  on  the  fossil  fishes  stands  to  this  day.  His  descriptions 
have  never  been  excelled.  The  classifications  have  of  neces- 
sity changed  with  the  advance  of  knowledge,  but  his  great 
volumes  on  the  fossil  fishes,  written  when  he  was  a  young 
man,  are  extraordinarily  fine  contributions  to  knowl- 
edge. Alexander's  work  on  the  sea  urchins,  of  which 
group  he  was  the  world's  authority,  stands  out  with  the 
same  preeminent  brilliance  as  his  father's  work  on  the 
fossil  fishes.  To  this  point  I  think  we  may  truthfully  say 
that  both  men  have  run  neck  and  neck,  with  Louis  a  Httle 
in  the  lead,  in  that  his  geological  work  was  far  more  im- 
portanr. 


Photo  by  IV.  McM.   U'oodwoitli 


Alexander  Agassiz  and  the  Sultan  of  the  Maldive  Islands 
Aboard  the  ''ADira,'  i^oi 


Scientists  and  Philosophers  215 

From  this  point  on,  however,  candor  forces  one  to  admit 
that  Louis  takes  another  great  step  in  advance.  He  revolu- 
tionized the  teaching  of  biology  in  America,  and  the  effect 
of  this  was  felt  all  over  the  world.  Introducing  laboratory 
methods  to  all  classrooms  of  school  and  college  was  a  real 
innovation,  and  his  marvelous  ability  as  a  lecturer  made 
him  one  of  the  most  revered  and  popular  geniuses  in 
America.  No  other  naturalist  was  ever  known  to  so  many 
people.  None  was  ever  so  universally  beloved.  Alexander 
was  too  shy  to  teach,  nor  did  he  lecture  well.  As  a  matter  of 
fact  I  think  I  heard  him  speak  on  only  one  occasion,  and 
it  was  obvious  he  hated  to  do  it  just  as  much  as  I  do.  The 
tragic  death  of  his  lovely  young  wife  but  a  few  days  after 
the  death  of  his  father  had  a  deep  effect  upon  his  inner- 
most nature,  as  any  frightful  grief  affects  a  man.  He  had  a 
quick,  fiery  temper,  sharp  likes  and  dislikes,  but  beneath 
his  rather  forbidding  and  stern  exterior  he  had  a  warm, 
affectionate  nature,  and  he  was  always  kind  and  encouraging 
to  young  men.  I  recall  that  we  brought  back  a  strange 
sponge  from  our  first  very  amateurish  dredging  trip  in  the 
Bahamas,  and  he  took  the  greatest  interest  in  helping  me 
try  to  find  its  name,  admiring  its  beauty  and  otherwise 
showing  a  friendly  interest. 

His  father  was  no  better  businessman  than  I  am.  Alex- 
ander developed  great  mines,  made  money  for  himself  and 
many  others,  and  was  unbelievably  generous  to  the  Museum. 
To  be  sure  he  was  interested  in  some  departments  and 
neglected  others.  But  who  had  a  better  right?  Mr.  W.  E. 
Cory  told  me  that  he  considered  Mr.  Agassiz  very  extrava- 
gant as  a  mine  executive,  but  here  again  the  proof  of  the 
pudding  is  that  the  Calumet  &  Hecla  Mining  Company 


216  Naturalist  at  Large 

paid  more  millions  in  dividends  than  one  likes  to  think  of 
in  these  rather  threadbare  days. 

I  have  tried  to  set  forth  my  opinion  realistically  and 
fairly.  As  I  have  said,  Mr.  Lowell  maintained  that  Louis 
Agassiz  was  the  greater  figure  of  the  two.  He  was  un- 
questionably correct  in  the  final  analysis,  but  both  were 
very  great  men,  and  their  like  I  do  not  meet  now. 

For  years  Uncle  Bill  Wheeler  and  I  projected  a  book 
on  the  contribution  made  to  the  study  of  natural  history 
by  amateurs.  Then  came  his  untimely  death,  and  I  have 
not  thought  again  of  the  project  until  now.  I  received  a  few 
days  ago  with  the  compliments  of  the  Carnegie  Foundation 
a  book  entitled  Th'e  Amateur  Scientist  by  W.  Stephen 
Thomas.  This  sets  forth  in  brief  but  fascinating  form  the 
contributions  of  the  amateurs  not  only  to  biology  but  to 
physics,  chemistry,  astronomy,  mathematics,  and  other 
disciplines  in  their  widest  sense.  In  biology  alone  think  of 
the  effect  of  the  work  of  Darwin,  in  entomology  of  Sir 
John  Lubbock,  Henri  Fabre,  or  of  Lord  Rothschild,  in 
geology  of  Hugh  Miller  and  Frank  Buckland,  in  genetics 
of  the  monk  Gregor  Mendel. 

In  natural  history  no  name  stands  forth  more  pre- 
eminently than  that  of  the  Reverend  J.  G.  Wood,  whose 
books  have  led  children  on  to  an  interest  in  animal  life  for 
well  over  half  a  century.  I  can  bear  witness  that  they 
fascinated  me  as  a  youngster,  and  that  I  read  and  reread 
many  of  them  until  they  were  completely  worn-out.  Take 
the  case  of  Gilbert  W^hite,  for  instance,  whose  Natural 
History  of  Selborne  has  been  translated  into  many  lan- 
guages and  appeared  in  numberless  editions.  Even  herpetol- 


Scientists  and  Philosophers  217 

ogy,  which  generally  speaking  has  not  been  popular  among 
amateurs  of  natural  history,  had  its  champion  in  Dr.  J.  E. 
Holbrook  of  Charleston,  South  Carolina,  whose  America?! 
Herpetology  is  a  classic  to  this  day. 

While  this  list  is  by  no  means  to  be  despised,  and  while 
it  would  be  hard  to  match  what  it  has  meant  to  the  world 
with  an  equal  number  of  names  of  college  professors,  it 
becomes  infinitely  more  impressive  if  we  add  a  few  names 
drawn  from  other  fields.  Isaac  Newton  was  a  govern- 
ment clerk.  Leeuwenhoek,  the  father  of  microscopy,  was 
a  Dutch  merchant.  Joseph  Priestley,  always  thought  of  as 
a  chemist,  was  in  reality  a  parson.  Sir  Frederick  William 
Herschel  was  an  organist,  and  an  astronomer  and  mathe- 
matician only  on  the  side,  so  to  speak. 

I  have  given  in  barest  outline  what  Wheeler  and  I  often 
talked  over  in  the  Eateria,  for  we  lunched  together  1087 
times  after  we  began  to  keep  the  record  of  the  Eateria  Janu- 
ary I,  1930.  Of  course,  there  are  others,  like  Benjamin 
Franklin,  of  equal  fame  and  many  more  whom  we  spoke  of 
that  I  do  not  recall.  The  whole  matter  has  lain  completely 
dormant  in  my  mind  for  a  number  of  years.  Stephen  Thomas 
has  made  an  excellent  book  and  recalled  these  pleasant  con- 
versations with  Wheeler.  The  subject  is  a  fascinating  one 
not  only  in  the  recording  of  what  the  amateur  has  done  in 
the  past,  but  in  stimulating  speculation  of  what  the  future 
may  bring  forth. 

I  wrote  to  my  friend  Henry  James  asking  whom  I  should 
thank  for  having  sent  me  Mr.  Thomas's  book.  He  answered 
giving  me  the  information  desired,  and  continued  with  an 
observation  which  I  think  is  well  worthy  of  record.  He 
wrote:  — 


218  Naturalist  at  Large 

When  I  was  on  the  Board  of  Overseers,  I  was  pretty- 
constantly  on  Visiting  Committees  that  visited  botani- 
cal and  biological  departments,  and  I  got  very  much 
interested  in  a  fact,  as  to  which  I  worked  up  a  lot  of 
figures,  for  a  report  to  the  Overseers,  viz.,  that  the 
graduate  students  in  biology  are  on  the  whole  not 
graduates  of  Harvard  College.  The  undergraduates 
who  take  much  biology  at  Harvard  don't  pursue  the 
subject  except  at  the  Medical  School  or  elsewhere. 
And  the  implications  and  explanations  of  this,  to  you, 
perfectly  familiar  fact  seemed  to  me  quite  interesting. 
What  used  to  be  called  Natural  History  ought  to  be 
one  of  the  best  cultural  studies.  A  man  who  cannot 
use  his  eyes  and  ears  as  he  goes  about  in  his  physical 
environment  and  cannot  learn  about  the  universe  ex- 
cept by  digging  himself  into  the  stacks  of  the  Widener 
Library  and  putting  on  a  pair  of  spectacles  is  only 
half  a  man.  But  for  some  strange  reason  two  genera- 
tions of  scientists  have  chosen  to  treat  amateur  natural- 
ists as  triflers,  the  systematist  as  a  pedant;  and  the  school 
teachers  have  failed  pretty  completely  to  do  much  with 
natural  science.  Crazy  and  deplorable! ! 

This  is  something  which  Howard  Parker  has  also  often 
spoken  about.  He  has  remarked  on  many  occasions  how  few 
of  his  colleagues  teaching  biology  in  Cambridge  are  gradu- 
ates of  Harvard  College.  Robert  Jackson  was  until  he 
retired.  Henry  Bigelow,  Jeffries  Wyman,  and  I  are  the 
only  three  on  the  present  staff  if  I  mistake  not. 


PART  III 

THE  LEISURELY  NATURALIST 


CHAPTER  XIX 

Florida  and  Some  Snakes 


D 


URING  and  after  the  last  war  the  family  lived  in 
Palm  Beach  —  a  less  sophisticated  Palm  Beach  than  that  of 
today.  Some  months  after  the  Armistice,  when  I  finished 
the  office  work  in  Cuba,  I  spent  a  lot  of  time  hunting  and 
fishing  in  Florida  with  Frank  Carlyle.  Frank  was  much  more 
than  a  guide,  for  I  needed  no  guide  in  that  part  of  the  world. 
He  was  an  ideal  companion,  an  amazing  shot,  a  born 
naturalist,  and  he  had  a  homing  sense  which  was  uncanny. 
It  was  nothing  to  walk  in  the  pinewoods  for  hours  and 
then,  feeling  hungry,  to  suggest,  "Frank,  let's  go  to  camp." 
And  we  would  walk  straight  oif ,  with  Frank  in  the  lead,  and 
pretty  soon  there  would  be  the  old  Model  T  beachwagon 
and  our  tent.  Frank  was  a  good  cook,  too,  and  his  quail 
and  doves  cooked  with  rice  were  succulent  beyond  belief. 
One  day  we  put  up  a  big  flock  of  turkey  which  flew  into 
a  high  strand  of  cypresses.  It  was  too  near  dark  to  do  any- 
thing with  them,  so  on  Frank's  suggestion  we  turned  in. 
About  midnight  he  got  up,  went  to  town,  and  came  back 
with  a  live  hen  turkey  which  he  said  he  had  borrowed.  We 
went  to  where  we  thought  our  wild  birds  might  be  likely 
to  fly  down  and  tethered  our  hen  by  a  long  string  to  a  young 
pine  tree.  Then  we  went  off  and  hid.  The  sun  came  up 
hot  and  clear.  We  sat  about,  but  something  happened  and 
we  heard  no  yelps  to  indicate  the  approach  of  our  wild 
birds.  Before  long  we  stretched  out  on  the  sand  and  were 


222  Naturalist  at  Large 

fast  asleep.  We  dozed  for  perhaps  an  hour  until  we  were 
suddenly  awakened  by  the  crack  of  a  gun.  We  sat  up  to  see 
the  most  surprised  Seminole  Indian  any  living  man  ever 
beheld.  He  had  shot  our  tethered  hen.  We  asked  him  to 
lunch,  but  he  walked  off  in  disgust.  He  made  no  move, 
however,  to  indicate  that  he  thought  the  bird  was  his. 

We  never  hesitated  to  camp  and  to  leave  our  things  lying 
about  if  the  spot  we  had  chosen  was  near  an  Indian  village 
or  one  of  their  temporary  encampments.  Crackers  would 
sometimes  steal,  Indians  never  —  at  least,  not  in  our  experi- 
ence. I  inadvertently  used  the  word  "cracker"  then.  Every- 
one knows  that  the  native  sons  of  Georgia  and  Florida  are 
called  by  this  name,  but  it  was  not  until  I  stumbled  on 
a  simple  statement  in  Bartram's  Travels  that  I  knew  the 
derivation  of  the  term.  The  corn  crackers  are  those  people 
who  sincerely  enjoy  that  delectable  viand,  grits  and  gravy; 
for  grits,  you  know,  are  made  of  cracked  corn. 

My  father-  and  mother-in-law  frequently  joined  us  in 
our  camp  for  the  day.  Mr.  Dean  Pierce  was  almost  blind 
but  was  able  to  fish  with  real  enjoyment.  Mrs.  Pierce,  the 
loveliest  mother-in-law  any  man  ever  had,  would  sit  in  a 
Livingstone  chair  in  a  shady  place  and  sew  or  knit  and 
enjoy  the  warmth  and  the  spring  songs  of  the  birds.  One 
day  Mr.  Pierce,  Frank,  and  I  were  fishing  in  the  canal  which 
had  just  been  made,  running  from  West  Palm  Beach  to 
Canal  Point  on  Lake  Okeechobee.  When  the  canal  was 
first  dug  and  its  banks  had  not  begun  to  wash  down,  the 
water  was  deep  and  the  bass  fishing  excellent. 

One  day  I  saw  the  corner  of  what  I  knew  was  an  ele- 
phant's tooth  sticking  out  of  the  canal  bank,  just  at  water 
level.  I  asked  Frank  to  row  over  to  it,  and  I  dug  the  tooth 


Florida  and  Some  Snakes  223 

i 

free  with  my  fingers,  for  it  was  buried  in  soft  sand.  Frank 
was  utterly  mystified;  declared  there  had  never  been  any 
circus  near  enough  to  suppose  a  dead  elephant  might  have 
been  buried  where  we  were.  I  kept  the  spot  in  mind,  how- 
ever, and  some  years  afterwards  went  back  while  visiting 
Charles  and  Louise  Choate  at  Pabn  Beach.  I  got  a  good 
many  interesting  bones  of  a  perfectly  gigantic  elephant 
and  fragments  of  some  other  things  as  well,  but  after  a 
month  or  more  of  steady  digging  it  was  quite  obvious  that 
the  best  of  the  material  had  been  smashed  up  and  dispersed 
in  the  process  of  digging  the  canal.  This  was  a  bitter  dis- 
appointment. 

I  have  a  shoulder  blade  of  this  elephant  here  in  the 
Museum  on  exhibition  now.  I  showed  it  to  Dr.  Forster 
Cooper,  Director  of  the  British  Museum,  when  he  last 
visited  us.  He  said  that  beyond  question  it  represented  the 
largest  individual  elephant  that  he  had  ever  seen,  and  he 
was  widely  experienced.  The  shoulder  blade  of  a  fair-sized 
mastodon  which  is  mounted  in  our  Museum  is  literally 
only  about  60  per  cent  in  height  or  area  compared  to  our 
Palm  Beach  giant.  I  have  just  measured  our  mastodon, 
which  stands  about  8'  3"  at  the  withers,  probably  8'  8"  or 
9"  in  life,  whereas  the  shoulder  blade  from  Palm  Beach, 
assuming  the  proportions  are  more  or  less  those  of  the 
mastodon,  which  they  were  not,  for  we  know  the  Florida 
elephant  was  much  longer-legged  in  proportion,  indicates 
an  animal  13'  10"  high,  and  probably  considerably  more. 
There  is  an  enormous  elephant  in  the  Amherst  College 
Museum  which  Dr.  Loomis  bought  from  C.  P.  Singleton, 
who  dug  it  up  at  Melbourne,  Florida,  only  a  few  miles  from 
Grandmother's  old  home.  This  is  a  huge  animal,  but  not 


224  Naturalist  at  Large 

so  big  as  the  one  I  might  have  found  with  better  luck.  As 
a  matter  of  fact,  I  should  have  had  the  one  that  Loomis 
got  if  I  had  heard  of  its  existence  just  a  little  sooner. 

I  traveled  for  years  with  a  wonderful  companion, 
Winthrop  Sprague  Brooks.  He  was  a  talented  naturalist 
who,  unfortunately,  did  not  see  fit  to  continue  work  in 
the  field  of  zoology.  We  were  together  in  Florida  on  many 
occasions  and  frequently  collected  around  the  Royal  Palm 
Hammock  in  the  very  southern  tip  of  the  state. 

It  was  when  the  hard  black  roads  were  first  put  in  and 
before  the  snakes  which  crawled  out  to  warm  themselves 
on  particularly  cool  nights  had  been  largely  exterminated 
by  motor  travel  as  they  have  been  now.  This  has  happened 
to  countless  thousands  upon  thousands  of  reptiles.  Indeed, 
like  Professor  Shaler,  I  once  made  a  computation  to  prove 
this  point.  Fairchild  and  I,  crossing  on  the  road  from  Miami 
to  Everglades  —  it  was  in  the  very  early  morning  —  got  out 
to  look  at  some  birds.  As  far  as  one  could  see  down  the  road 
there  were  little  patches  which  reflected  the  rising  sun's 
rays.  Upon  examination  we  found  that  each  one  of  these 
was  a  remnant  of  a  snake,  mostly  ground  and  polished  bits 
of  skin  of  young  water  moccasins.  We  measured  the  width 
of  the  road  and  counted  the  number  of  remnants  in  a 
distance  of  about  one  hundred  yards  and  thus  figured  out 
the  probable  slaughter  along  the  eighty  miles  from  Miami  to 
Ochopee.  I  have  lost  the  slip  of  paper  with  our  figuring  but 
the  number  was  absolutely  unbelievable. 

Well,  this  sort  of  thing  was  happening  in  a  minor  way 
when  Brooks  and  I  were  at  the  Royal  Palm  Hammock.  I 
had  seen  several  remnants  in  too  bad  shape  to  save  as  a 


Florida  and  Some  Snakes  22  S 

specimen  of  what  I  was  certain  was  a  new  king  snake. 
Finally  I  got  a  beautiful  specimen.  I  had  nothing  to  put  it 
in  at  the  time  I  caught  it  but  a  stiff  paper  bag,  which  I 
carried  back  to  Palm  Beach  and  set  down  in  our  bedroom. 
It  was  late  in  the  evening  and  I  did  nothing  about  preserv- 
ing the  specimen  that  night.  When  I  woke  up  the  next 
morning,  lo  and  behold  the  bag  was  empty.  We  pulled  the 
room  apart  without  finding  our  snake.  I  overlooked  until 
later  a  rat  hole  under  one  of  the  doors.  But  we  found  out 
where  the  snake  was  before  very  long,  for  wild  cries  from 
the  kitchen  took  me  out  there  on  the  run.  The  snake,  about 
five  feet  long,  was  neatly  coiled  up  next  the  hot-water 
boiler,  apparently  entirely  satisfied  with  life. 

This  snake  is  now  M.  C.  Z.  number  12,456  and  is  the 
type  of  Lampropeltis  brooksi,  named  for  my  friend. 

I  believe  a  hundred  years  from  now  there  is  one  thing 
that  conchologists  are  certain  to  say  —  "It  was  a  darn  good 
thing  old  T.  B.  got  interested  in  Ligs  when  he  did."  Ligs, 
be  it  known,  are  the  tree  snails  of  the  genus  Liguus.  Their 
distribution  is  strictly  limited  to  parts  of  Cuba,  Isle  of  Pines, 
Haiti,  the  Florida  Keys,  and  the  extreme  southern  part  of 
the  peninsula  of  Florida  itself.  Moreover,  in  Florida  they 
are  not  generally  distributed.  They  are  only  associated  with 
certain  types  of  trees  which  grow  in  those  enigmatical  plant 
associations  known  as  hammocks. 

The  origin  of  these  tiny  islands  of  tropical  broad-leaved 
trees  scattered  about  in  the  pine  lands  is  very  difficult  to 
explain,  but  the  fact  remains  that  once  there  were  many  of 
these  hammocks  scattered  over  south  Florida  and  a  few  in 
the  Keys.  The  very  fact  of  their  existence  is  proof  of  the 


226  Naturalist  at  Large 

presence  of  good  soil.  Years  ago  it  became  clear  to  me  that 
the  hammocks  were  going  to  be  cut  over  for  plantations  and 
the  snails  would  disappear.  In  fact,  way  back  when  I  was 
a  boy  I  observed  "Saws,"  as  the  Negroes  from  the  Bahamas 
are  called  down  in  the  Miami  area,  using  long  bamboos  to 
knock  the  snails  out  of  the  trees  of  the  Great  Brickell 
Hammock.  They  used  them  for  fish  bait. 

I  made  up  my  mind  to  get  a  representation  of  the  snails 
from  every  hammock  within  the  Umits  of  their  distribution, 
roughly  from  south  of  a  line  drawn  from  Fort  Lauderdale 
westward  across  the  state.  When  I  started  out,  our  collec- 
tion of  these  marvelously  beautiful  creatures  was  but  a  few 
hundred,  whereas  today  we  have  43,235  individuals  in  the 
collection  from  490  localities,  representing  6$  named  forms, 
with  48  types.  For  anyone  with  an  eye  for  beauty,  it  is  a  joy 
to  collect  Ligs.  The  whole  group  of  shells  is  in  a  state  of 
flux,  evolutionarily  speaking,  and  there  are  over  60  color 
varieties.  Some  are  pure  white  with  pink  stripes,  some  white 
with  green,  some  exactly  Hke  tortoise  shell,  some  pure 
white,  varying  also  in  size  and  form.  These  creatures  indeed 
are  so  beautiful  that  a  cult  of  Liguus  collectors  has  come 
into  being  and  thousands  of  specimens  have  been  gathered 
up  with  no  record  whence  they  came.  These  are  now  re- 
posing in  the  hands  of  people  who  do  not  appreciate  the 
story  that  they  could  tell  if  complete  data  had  been  kept 
when  they  were  gathered.  Ligs  have  disappeared  from  many 
localities  where  they  were  once  abundant  and  I  take  satis- 
faction in  the  fact  that  before  they  disappeared  we  got  the 
best  collection  of  Liguus  in  the  world.  And  none  better 
will  ever  be  made. 


Florida  and  Some  Snakes  227 

A  fishing  trip  to  Everglades  has  been  an  annual  feature 
of  my  visits  with  the  Fairchilds  at  Coconut  Grove.  We  have 
had  the  same  boatman  for  years  and,  by  planning  far  enough 
ahead,  I  have  usually  been  able  to  get  the  same  cottage  for 
a  few  days'  stay.  The  chance  to  visit  this  strange  labyrinth 
of  waterways,  which  comprises  the  deltas  of  half  a  dozen 
rivers  emptying  into  the  Bay  of  Ten  Thousand  Islands,  has 
been  fascinating  because  there  have  always  been  botanists 
involved.  First,  of  course,  there  has  been  David  Fairchild 
himself,  though  he  was  not  present  the  day  John  Phillips 
was  with  me  and  we  saw  a  big  panther  walk  across  an 
open  glade  in  the  mangrove  forest. 

Of  our  Museum  crowd,  Ted  White  and  Barbara  and 
William  Schevill  know  this  country  and  helped  to  get  an 
interesting  lot  of  mammals,  particularly  raccoons.  Years 
ago,  E.  W.  Nelson  showed  that  the  raccoons  of  south 
Florida  broke  up  into  a  lot  of  races,  which  he  named.  I  was 
doubtful  whether  these  races  would  stand  up  when  long 
series  of  the  animals  were  compared.  As  raccoons  are  ex- 
tremely abundant  in  the  forests  around  Everglades,  we 
made  up  a  test  series  to  see  how  much  variation  was  shown 
among  the  individuals  and  found  there  was  practically  none. 
Nelson  was  right. 

My  friends  Harold  and  Sis  Loomis  with  their  Margie 
and  Jim  have  often  been  most  delightful  and  co-operative 
companions.  They  love  to  fish  and  they  do  not  think  I  am 
crazy  because  I  frequently  sit  back  for  hours  at  a  time  and 
just  look  into  the  woods  as  we  troll  slowly  by.  Last  year 
Professor  Elmer  D.  Merrill,  the  distinguished  Director  of 
the  Arnold  Arboretum  —  Elmira  to  me,  though  I  do  not 
know  exactly  why  —  was  along,  and  I  felt  a  patriotic  thrill 


228  Naturalist  at  Large 

when  he  declared  that  the  formation  of  shore  plants  in  the 
mangrove  area  was  as  fine  in  their  majestic  size  as  anything 
in  the  PhiHppines,  although,  of  comrse,  infinitely  less  varied 
in  the  number  of  species  of  trees. 

During  the  last  few  years  a  good  part  of  my  time  has  been 
enjoyably  and  profitably  expended  in  watching  the  excava- 
tion at  the  Thomas  Farm  in  Gilchrist  County,  Florida.  Years 
ago  on  a  visit  to  the  Museum  of  the  Geological  Survey  in 
Tallahassee  I  saw  the  fragmentary  fossils  which  Clarence 
Simpson  found  in  193 1  and  which  were  sent  to  the  Ameri- 
can Museum  in  New  York  for  description.  Some  years 
passed  by,  and  by  1938  it  was  quite  obvious  that  with  the 
Florida  Survey  being  forced  to  specialize  on  economic 
geology,  there  was  no  likelihood  that  anyone  was  going  to 
take  an  interest  in  the  Thomas  Farm  locality.  I  decided  to 
explore  the  locality  thoroughly.  Herman  Gunter  and 
Clarence  Simpson  of  the  Survey  gave  me  every  assistance, 
marked  maps  and  made  sketches.  Finally,  with  some  dif- 
ficulty, because  there  are  numberless  "Thomas  Farms"  in 
our  county,  the  Raeford  Thomas  Farm  was  located  in  the 
scrub  about  eight  miles  northeast  of  Bell.  A  further  dif- 
ficulty was  that  all  the  dim  roads  in  the  scrub  change  from 
year  to  year,  as  ruts  get  too  deep  and  new  routes  are  found. 

Gilchrist  County  is  self-contained.  Strangers  do  not  come 
there,  and  the  residents  are  suspicious  of  anyone  who  comes 
in  from  even  a  few  miles  away.  With  the  aid  of  William 
and  Barbara  Schevill,  who  were  my  companions  several 
years  ago,  we  began  to  dig  at  the  abandoned  farm  site. 
There  were  the  remains  of  the  old  well,  and  it  was  on  the 
spoil  bank  beside  this  well  that  Clarence  Simpson  found 


Florida  and  Some  Snakes  229 

the  horse  teeth  which  were  the  first  indications  that  there 
were  Miocene  mammals  to  be  found  here.  He  certainly  de- 
serves the  greatest  credit  for  his  instantaneous  appreciation 
of  the  importance  of  this  site. 

Deposits  of  Miocene  Age  throughout  eastern  North 
America  are  generally  of  marine  origin.  In  the  West  they 
are  abundantly  developed  and  exposed  in  the  Badlands, 
where  an  unbeUevable  number  of  vertebrate  fossils  have 
been  found.  Before  we  dug  at  the  Thomas  Farm  we  had  no 
picture  of  Miocene  life  on  land  in  the  Eastern  United 
States  that  was  of  anything  but  the  most  fragmentary 

sort. 

By  extreme  good  fortune  we  enlisted  two  extraordinary 
helpers.  Uncle  Frank  Douglas  and  John  Henry  Miller  were 
characters  that  might  have  stepped  from  the  pages  of  The 
Yearling.  In  spite  of  the  fact  that  we  were  strangers,  hence 
very  unwelcome  in  a  region  abounding  in  moonshine  stills 
and  where  one  of  our  near  neighbors  w^as  a  murderer  who 
had  left  a  neighboring  state  for  excellent  reasons,  we  became 
and  are  fast  friends.  John  Henry  and  Uncle  Frank  can  take 
out  a  badly  crushed  rhino  skull  and  "make  a  biscuit  of  it," 
as  we  say,  cutting  down  around  it  until  it  stands  on  top  of  a 
pinnacle,  and  plastering  it  up  with  strips  of  burlap  soaked  in 
thin  plaster  of  Paris.  Then,  after  this  covering  is  hard, 
they  undercut  the  fossil  and  turn  it  over,  then  plaster  it  up 
on  the  bottom  side. 

From  a  little  hole  our  dig  has  grown  until  now  you  could 
put  a  big  house  in  the  excavation.  And  the  end  is  not  yet, 
for  while  we  have  taken  out  i8  genera  and  22  species  of 
mammals,  most  of  them  undescribed  and  many  of  them 
curious  and  bizarre,  we  have  indications  that  there  are  at 


230  Naturalist  at  Large 

least  as  many  more  represented  by  fragments  too  incomplete 
to  stand  as  types  of  described  species. 

After  suffering  a  good  deal  of  amateur  blackmail  and 
threats  of  violence  from  a  neighbor  who  claimed  to  have 
a  lease  on  the  abandoned  farm,  we  finally  found  that  it  was 
owned  by  a  bank  in  Macon,  Georgia,  which  had  taken  it  by 
foreclosure  many,  many  years  before.  I  bought  the  forty 
acres  around  the  dig,  and  now  have  deeded  them  to  the 
University  of  Florida,  which  is  located  at  Gainesville  only 
forty-five  miles  away. 

The  digging  is  finished  for  the  time  being,  and  we  have 
built  John  Henry  Miller  a  little  house  there  of  an  archi- 
tecture typical  of  the  country.  Our  house  has  a  room  at  one 
end  for  a  kitchen,  a  "breezeway"  in  the  middle,  and  a  room 
beyond  the  breezeway  in  which  to  sleep.  John  Henry  has 
planted  wild  verbena  around  the  yard,  and  our  friends 
Archie  and  Margie  Carr,  of  the  Department  of  Biology  at 
the  University,  have  brought  out  bulbs  and  seeds.  During 
the  last  year  when  I  have  been  rather  on  the  feeble  side 
with  a  nervous  and  irritable  heart,  I  could  sit  in  the  shade 
and  watch  the  butterflies  visit  the  flowers  in  the  yard,  listen 
to  the  earthy  Elizabethan  speech  of  my  friends  digging  near 
at  hand,  and  look  forward  each  day  to  a  cornpone,  side 
meat,  and  collard  greens,  or  a  gopher-turtle  stew  prepared 
by  John  Henry's  master  hand. 

From  small  beginnings  the  Thomas  Farm  has  grown  so 
that  now  it  is  the  most  important  and  most  famous  vertebrate 
fossil  locality  in  the  Eastern  United  States,  and  I  have  a 
hunch  that  a  generation  hence  scientists  are  going  to  say 
that  spotting  and  opening  the  Thomas  Farm  dig  was  a  good 
job. 


Florida  and  Some  Snakes  231 

Before  Dr.  T.  E.  White  went  to  the  Army,  he  left  a 
manuscript  concerning  the  finds  at  the  Thomas  Farm. 
Since  he  is  a  speciahst  in  the  study  of  fossil  mammals,  I  can 
give  a  better  outline  of  the  material  which  has  been  ex- 
cavated than  I  could  do  with  my  own  knowledge  unaided. 

The  high  lights  were  the  discovery  that  no  less  than 
five  species  of  little  three-toed  horses  apparently  lived  in 
this  part  of  the  world  at  the  same  time.  These  varied  in  size 
from  that  of  a  collie  dog  to  that  of  a  Shetland  pony  —  a 
small  pony.  The  situation  must  have  been  somewhat  similar 
to  that  on  the  Athi  Plains  in  East  Africa  where  one  may  see 
Impallah,  Thompson,  and  Roberts  gazelles  all  mixed  up 
together  in  great  herds.  They  are  just  about  as  different, 
one  from  the  other,  as  these  little  horses  were.  Of  course 
the  fact  that  these  fossil  remains,  disassociated  and  re- 
deposited,  have  been  water-borne  from  the  place  where 
they  were  first  laid  down  may  well  mean  that  they  are  not 
strictly  contemporaneous  —  but  that  we  can't  tell  about 
now. 

There  were  two  types  of  rhinos,  a  small  one  and  an 
enormous,  long-legged  beast  which  must  have  been  an  im- 
pressive animal  to  see. 

There  were  also  an  unusual  number  of  doglike  animals, 
some  the  size  of  coyotes,  and  others  at  least  as  large  as  the 
grizzly  bear.  There  is  very  little  evidence  of  the  presence 
of  any  feline  forms  but  most  astonishing  of  all  are  the  two 
genera  of  an  extinct  group  of  mammals  called  the  Hyper- 
tragulids.  These  are  relatives  of  our  deer  but  they  have 
skulls  so  elongated  that  I  once  facetiously  described  one  of 
them  as  a  hoofed  anteater.  It  is  difficult  to  imagine  what 
specialized  feeding  habits  may  be  tied  up  with  this  peculiar 


232  Naturalist  at  Large 

head  form.  It  is  not  unlikely  that  the  skull  was  modified  for 
probing  for  and  picking  up  aquatic  vegetation. 

Most  tantalizing  of  all  the  vast  quantity  of  material  which 
has  been  brought  to  Cambridge  and  sorted  out  are  the 
remnants  which  prove  that  there  are  at  least  twelve  more 
animals  represented  by  fragmentary  bits,  too  incomplete 
to  make  certain  of  their  identity;  hence  at  least  there  are 
twelve  more  forms  to  encourage  one  to  dig  further,  and 
of  course  there  may  be  a  great  many  more  than  twelve. 

Shortly  after  the  First  World  War  Lord  William  Percy 
came  to  spend  a  week  end  with  us  in  Palm  Beach.  He  ended 
by  staying  well  over  a  month  and  certainly  he  was  a  fascinat- 
ing companion.  A  short,  spare  man  with  keen  aquiline 
features,  he  started  as  a  brilliant  barrister  in  London,  rose 
to  be  a  Colonel  with  the  Grenadier  Guards  in  the  war,  was 
badly  wounded,  and  had  been  decorated  with  the  D.S.O. 
Now  he  was  seeking  refreshment  in  his  avocation,  which 
was  ornithology.  He  was  particularly  interested  in  the  suc- 
cessions of  plumage  in  our  many  species  of  ducks. 

Our  Florida  dusky  ducks  fascinated  him.  He  was  a 
wonderful  shot  and  rapidly  made  up  a  superb  series  of  speci- 
mens. He  was  keen  to  find  out  something  of  the  habits  of 
the  little  secretive  masked  duck,  a  bird  which  is  widely 
distributed  but  which  has  been  very  rare  in  collections.  I 
knew  a  place  in  Cuba  where  they  were  said  to  be  found 
and  we  sailed  off  to  see  if  I  had  the  story  correctly.  My 
friend  Mr.  Carlos  ("Charlie")  Hernandez  was  then  Post- 
master General  of  the  Island,  and  we  joined  forces  with  his 
brother  and  camped  in  a  big,  aromatic  tobacco  barn  —  it 
was  only  partially  filled  —  near  San  Antonio  de  los  Bafios. 


Florida  and  Some  Snakes  233 

Near-by  Lake  Ariguanabo  was,  as  it  always  is  during  the 
dry  season,  a  great  sea  of  "bonnets"  or  imlangiietas  as  these 
leaves  are  called  in  Spanish.  I  like  the  name  "bonnet,"  for 
it  is  descriptive  of  those  stiff,  curled-up,  water-lily  leaves 
in  which  little  yellow  rails  frequently  hide  and  over  which 
the  sharp-eyed  grackles  continuously  creep  about  seeking 
out  the  bonnet  worms  which  bore  into  the  stems.  The  lake 
is  variable  in  size,  covering  several  hundred  acres  during 
the  rainy  season. 

Native  hunters  appeared  when  the  grapevine  telegraph 
got  working  and  I  asked  them  about  getting  for  us  speci- 
mens of  the  pato  agostero,  as  the  masked  duck  is  locally 
named.  They  replied  that  this  was  easy  but  that  shooting 
would  have  to  be  done  at  dawn  when  there  was  no  breeze 
to  move  the  bonnets.  This  mystified  us  a  bit  at  first  but  we 
found  afterwards  that  the  natives  push  a  little  cockleshell 
about,  standing  up  and  watching  the  bonnets.  When  they 
surprise  a  duck  it  dives,  swims  off  with  just  its  bill  stuck 
up  above  the  surface  of  the  water,  and,  of  course,  rustling 
the  bonnets  a  bit  as  it  swims  away.  Now  the  extraordinary 
fact  is  that  these  men  are  never  fooled  by  turtles,  which, 
when  disturbed,  rush  off  stirring  the  bonnets  also,  for  the 
men  know  the  rate  of  speed  of  turtle  and  duck.  By  shooting 
just  ahead  of  the  quaking  leaves  moved  by  the  ducks,  they 
get  pretty  nearly  every  individual  they  shoot  at.  They  soon 
brought  us  all  the  ducks  that  Percy  wanted. 

Ruddy  ducks  were  present  in  the  same  lake  and,  of 
course  were  often  killed  as  well  as  the  masked  ducks.  Their 
habits  are  very  similar.  When  either  of  these  birds  came  to 
rest  it  was  almost  always  among  the  malanguetas.  The 
name  agostero  or  August  duck  is  derived  from  a  reputed 


234  Naturalist  at  Large 

nesting  in  August  and  the  fact  that  it  is  apparently  more 
abundant  at  that  time.  I  suspect  that  this  simply  means 
there  was  more  open  water  then  and  so  both  masked  ducks 
and  ruddy  ducks  were  seen  more  frequently. 

I  asked  Percy  to  transcribe  the  notes  which  he  had  made 
during  our  Cuban  trip.  He  answered:  — 

According  to  local  information,  the  masked  ducks 
are  much  less  secretive  in  late  summer  and  autumn  when 
the  lake  is  higher  and  provides  less  cover  from  view; 
in  such  conditions  we  were  told  that  the  masked  ducks 
flew  a  good  deal  of  their  own  accord,  especially  early 
and  late  in  the  day,  and  experience  elsewhere  with  these 
birds  did  not  suggest  that  they  were  difficult  to  flush, 
though  they  rarely  flew  farther  than  the  nearest  patch 
of  cover.  On  the  other  hand  local  hunters  agreed  that, 
while  the  masked  ducks  took  to  wing  quite  frequently, 
the  ruddy  ducks  never  did  so  under  any  circumstances. 
This,  if  true,  is  remarkable,  but  it  is  possible  that  the 
Cuban  race,  being  entirely  stationary,  may  have  de- 
veloped a  more  skulking  habit  than  that  of  the  migra- 
tory race  in  Canada  and  the  United  States.  (It  certainly 
is  a  fact  that  the  Erismaturas  of  the  high  Andean  lakes 
are  so  unwilling  to  fly  as  to  give  an  impression  of  in- 
capacity to  do  so,  for  during  several  consecutive 
months  of  constant  association  with  them  I  never  saw 
one  on  the  wing,  although  we  frequently  tried  to  in- 
duce them  to  fly.) 

In  Cuba  the  ruddy  ducks  were  in  full  breeding  dress 
on  the  thirtieth  of  January  1921,  and  were  actually 
breeding  on  that  date,  whereas  the  male  masked  ducks 


Florida  and  Some  Snakes  235 

were  in  full  moult  and  young  birds  were  obtained 
which  appeared  to  be  from  four  to  five  months  old. 
We  were  told  that  this  bird  bred  in  August  and  was 
locally  known  as  Agostero  for  that  reason. 

The  call  of  the  male  masked  duck  is  very  distinctive, 
*'kirri-kirroo,  kirri  kirroo,  kirroo,  kirroo,  kirroo,'^  and 
the  bird  has  a  curious  habit  of  responding  like  a  cock 
pheasant  to  such  noises  as  the  banging  of  a  punt  pole 
on  the  water  or  an  explosion  in  the  distance.  The  fe- 
male makes  a  short  hissing  noise,  repeated  several 
times. 

No  firsthand  information  was  collected  with  regard 
to  these  birds'  nesting  habits,  but  a  local  hunter  pointed 
out  several  nests  which  he  said  were  those  of  masked 
ducks.  According  to  him,  the  nests  were  always  placed 
amongst  short,  round  rushes,  and  contained  from  five 
to  six  eggs  but  never  any  down  at  all. 

After  his  return  to  England  Will  Percy  and  I  corre- 
sponded in  a  desultory  way.  Once  I  went  to  visit  him  at 
Catfield  Hall,  near  Great  Yarmouth,  motoring  over  from 
Cambridge.  This  was  after  his  marriage.  For  in  July  1922 
he  wrote  me:  — 

Dear  Tom: 

I'm  too  busy  to  write,  and  too  happy  to  do  so  co- 
herently. I  am  going  to  get  married  on  25th  July  to 
Miss  Mary  Swinton  with  whose  family  mine  has 
swapped  for  nearly  1000  years.  Poor  girl  — she  gets 
a  bad  bargain  in  marrying  a  worn-out  fossil  of  forty 
(she  being  23)   but  she  is  bearing  up  wonderfully. 


236  Naturalist  at  Large 

Now  heaven  knows  what  I  do  —  take  the  first  job  any- 
where on  the  earth's  surface  at  which  I  can  earn 
enough  to  keep  her  in  comfort. 

Later  he  came  to  London  to  see  Rosamond  and  me.  I 
am  sorry  to  say  I  have  not  heard  from  him  for  a  long  time. 
I  know  his  section  of  England  has  been  terribly  bombed. 

Every  member  of  our  family  missed  him  after  he  left 
Florida  to  go  on  to  Panama  and  South  America,  ducking 
his  way  for  months  till  he  finally  got  back  to  England. 
He  never  wrote  up  his  observations,  for  John  Phillips  had 
his  monograph  far  advanced  and  Percy  generously  contrib- 
uted many  observations  which  enhanced  the  value  of  John's 
book.  His  collection  is  now  in  the  American  Museum  in 
New  York.  He  is  a  great  gentleman,  a  gallant  soldier, 
and  a  true  scientist  at  heart. 


CHAPTER  XX 

The  Tests  of  Evolution 


I 


THINK  there  is  more  misunderstanding  about  evolu- 
tion among  laymen  than  about  any  other  subject.  Of  course 
we  know  that  some  fundamentalists  still  deny  it.  I  am  not 
writing  for  them,  but  rather  for  those  who  have  been  led 
to  beUeve  that  the  whole  subject  is  settled  and  that  "scien- 
tists know  all  about  it,"  which  is  quite  untrue.  The  results 
of  evolutionary  processes  are  everywhere  easy  to  see,  but 
the  situation  is  really  like  that  of  the  man  who  sees  a  trolley 
car  for  the  first  time.  The  route  it  has  followed  and  the 
direction  in  which  it  is  going  are  clearly  to  be  seen,  and 
the  rate  at  which  it  progresses  is  obvious.  But  what  makes 
the  thing  move? 

Take  such  a  stock  as  that  of  the  horse,  where  the  fossil 
evidence  is  unusually  good.  Practically  every  single  grada- 
tion from  the  Uttle  fox-terrier-like  animal  of  thirty  milUon 
years  ago  to  the  present-day  horse  may  be  followed  with 
infinite  elaboration  of  detail.  The  horse  had  its  origin  in  the 
New  World  and  we  know  when  it  moved  from  the  New 
World  to  the  Old,  where  it  persisted  in  the  form  of  the 
zebras,  wild  asses,  and  wild  horses  of  Tibet.  The  skeletal 
remains  show  that  horses,  as  we  use  the  word  today,  existed 
in  Florida  down  to  perhaps  10,000  years  ago  in  unbeHevable 
numbers.  Then  they  died  out.  Why  they  died  out  remains 
a  mystery.  The  Spaniards  brought  horses  with  them  from 


238  Naturalist  at  Large 

Europe  and  enlarged  them  —  that  is,  turned  them  loose  — 
and  in  no  time  they  became  enormously  abundant  again. 

Few  laymen  know  that  the  camels  originated  in  America 
and  went  through  most  of  their  evolutionary  history  in 
what  is  now  the  western  part  of  the  United  States.  During 
the  height  of  the  glacial  period  enough  oceanic  water  was 
tied  up  in  the  gigantic  polar  icecap  to  lower  the  level  of 
the  oceans,  so  that  many  land  areas  now  separated  by 
water  were  then  connected.  Thus  the  camels  reached  the 
Old  World  and  the  elephants  reached  the  New;  and 
strangely  enough,  according  to  a  Russian  scholar,  Nazo- 
noif  by  name,  the  sheep  not  only  passed  from  Asia  to 
North  America  but  went  back  again,  leaving  the  ancestors 
of  all  our  various  species  of  bighorn  behind  them. 

Geologically  speaking,  a  fairly  recent  uplift  of  land 
formed  Central  America  (for  the  Caribbean  Sea  was  once 
a  bay  of  the  Pacific)  and  allowed  camels  to  reach  South 
America,  where  they  persist  as  the  llama,  alpaca,  guanaco, 
and  vicuiia.  The  stock  then  died  out  in  North  America. 
The  elephants  pushed  down  as  far  as  Ecuador  and  likewise 
disappeared,  as  they  did  all  over  North  America,  where 
they  once  existed  in  countless  numbers  of  individuals  and 
a  great  variety  of  species. 

I  can  hear  my  reader  ask,  "How  do  you  know  that  the 
Caribbean  was  once  a  bay  of  the  Pacific?"  The  answer  was 
given  by  Alexander  Agassiz  during  his  explorations  with 
the  steamship  Blake.  He  found  that  there  was  a  greater 
difference  between  the  deep-water  fauna  on  the  inside  and 
that  on  the  outside  of  the  arc  of  Lesser  Antillean  islands 
than  there  was  between  the  fauna  inside  the  arc  and  that 
on  the  Pacific  side  of  the  Isthmus  of  Panama.  Only  last 


The  Tests  of  Evolution  239 

year  I  described  a  lovely  rosy  Chaunax,  a  chubby,  pot- 
bellied deep-sea  fish  which  had  its  only  near  ally  in  one 
described  from  the  Bay  of  Panama,  and  my  fish  came  from 
the  south  coast  of  Cuba  in  a  thousand  fathoms  of  water. 

Unfortunately  the  lines,  "Some  call  it  Evolution,  And 
others  call  it  God,"  however  true  they  may  be,  savor  of 
the  trite  and  the  smug.  No  one  who  thinks  and  has  had 
a  real  chance  to  study  modern  paleontological  material 
doubts  the  fact  of  evolution,  but  the  mystery  behind  it  all 
is  deep  and  dark  and  as  worthy  of  our  worship,  if  you  will, 
as  it  ever  was.  Scientists  have  seen  the  evidence  where  evo- 
lution has  run  riot.  The  dinosaurs  reached  a  size  which  was 
mechanically  disadvantageous.  The  Irish  elk  proceeded  to 
produce  such  gigantic  horns  (which  presumably  were 
dropped  each  year)  that  their  very  renovation  from  year 
to  year  must  have  involved  a  fatal  weakening  of  the  stock, 
which  of  course  has  long  since  disappeared.  Cope  had  a 
phrase  for  this  process,  and  a  good  one,  too.  It  was  "super- 
abundant growth  force"  —  growth  in  a  particular  direction 
until  it  becomes  lethal. 

But  what  brings  this  force  into  being?  Darwin  provided 
a  couple  of  useful  slogans  —  "sexual  selection,"  "the  struggle 
for  existence,"  and  Spencer  added  "the  survival  of  the 
fittest." 

Each  one  of  these  explains  a  good  deal.  But  let  us  apply 
it,  for  instance,  to  the  leaf  butterfly  and  see  just  how  much 
it  helps  us.  Metaphorically  speaking,  a  racial  stock  of  but- 
terflies for  its  own  protection  starts  out  to  become  dead- 
leaf -like.  If  this  change  were  to  be  accomplished  by  natural 
selection  alone,  it  would  be  reasonable  to  suppose  that  as 


240  Naturalist  at  Large 

soon  as  the  butterflies  became  sufficiently  leaf-like  to  be 
protected  the  evolution  woiuld  cease.  It  did  no  such  thing. 
The  leaf  butterflies  of  the  Old  World  are  decorated  with 
marks  such  as  the  fungi  of  decay  produce  on  dead  leaves, 
and  have  ragged  wing  margins  which  look  like  wearings 
or  tearings  in  some  cases.  In  other  words,  they  have  be- 
come ridiculously  and  unnecessarily  dead-leaf-like.  Some- 
thing pushed  the  evolutionary  urge  along  far  beyond  ne- 
cessity. 

Lamarck  postulated  the  evolutionary  power  of  use  and 
disuse  and  believed  that  acquired  characters  might  be  in- 
herited. We  all  know,  however,  that  certain  sections  of  the 
human  race  have  mutilated  themselves  for  thousands  of 
generations  without  result,  and  we  know  that  in  the  old 
days  when  horses'  tails  were  regularly  cut  short,  no  short- 
tailed  colts  ever  appeared. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  to  be  realistic  in  our  appreciation 
of  evolution  we  have  to  be  willing  to  say,  "I  don't  know 
how  or  why,  but  it  is  there  just  the  same."  We  have  to 
avoid  believing  in  what  may  seem  to  be  too  obvious.  Con- 
sider how  fearful  the  ordinary  person  is  of  inbreeding. 
Such  and  such  animals  are  inbred;  hence  they  are  weak, 
stupid,  deformed,  or  what  have  you.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
animals  may  be  successfully  bred  for  countless  generations, 
brother  to  sister,  if  nothing  but  completely  sound  stock  is 
used  to  breed  from.  Of  course  one  abnormal  individual 
may  upset  the  strain  and  bad  results  will  then  appear,  but 
the  bad  results  do  not  come  from  the  inbreeding. 

I  have  recently  been  studying  a  group  of  fishing  frogs, 
deep-sea  fishes  in  which  the  first  element  of  the  dorsal  fin 
has  been  developed  into  a  fishing  rod.  In  some  of  the  fish 


The  Tests  of  Evolution  241 

this  is  capable  of  motion  and  may  be  moved  out  in  front 
of  the  fish's  mouth  and  waved  to  and  fro,  the  tip  of  the 
ray  being  beset  with  Httle  movable  filaments  which  are 
fished  about,  squirming  like  a  worm  on  a  hook,  to  lure 
small  fish  up  and  into  the  mouth  of  the  Antennarius. 

This  group  of  fishes  is  enormous,  and  in  some  species 
we  see  all  sorts  of  ridiculous  things  which  have  happened 
—  cases  where  a  rod  persists  as  only  a  useless  filament  in- 
capable of  motion;  cases  where  it  is  elaborated  into  an  or- 
gan so  complicated  and  so  absurd  that  it  is  hard  to  believe 
that  it  is  anything  but  an  ornament,  using  the  word  in  its 
zoological  sense.  The  creature  couldn't  possibly  get  that 
great  branching  affair  into  its  mouth.  Some  of  these  fish- 
ing frogs  are  just  gigantic  muscular  sacs  with  fins  so  de- 
generated that  obviously  the  creatures  cannot  move.  They 
have  great  cavern-like  mouths,  not  improbably  suffused 
with  a  luminous  slime  to  lure  fish  to  a  point  where,  with 
a  sudden  gulp,  they  can  be  engulfed  by  these  animated 
muscular  sacs. 

Many  of  the  baits  at  the  end  of  the  fishing  rods  are  lu- 
minous, and  some  rods  are  long  enough  so  that  this  lumi- 
nous bait  can  be  pushed  right  around  and  into  the  fish's 
mouth.  Then  he  snaps  on  the  electric  light,  the  little  fish 
come  up  inquisitively,  he  snaps  it  out  of  the  way,  the  mouth 
closes,  and  our  fishing  frog  is  fed. 

I  cite  the  extraordinary  example  of  evolution  presented 
by  the  fishing  frogs  because  to  me  it  is  absolutely  impos- 
sible to  see  how  the  first  step  ever  happened  to  take  place; 
it  is  simply  not  explainable  by  any  means  at  our  command. 
The  fishing  rod  had  to  be  a  good  fishing  rod  before  it 


242  Naturalist  at  Large 

served  the  fish  any  useful  purpose  at  all.  Now  explain  that 
if  you  can. 

This  discussion  may  sound  a  little  old-fashioned  to  a 
modern  specialist.  Recent  authors,  among  them  Richard 
Benedikt  Goldschmidt  of  the  University  of  California  and 
Ernst  Mayr  of  the  American  Museum  of  New  York,  have 
written  fascinating  books  concerning  the  modern  in- 
terpretation of  micro-  and  macro-evolution.  The  light 
which  modern  genetics  has  thrown  on  evolution  has  been 
carefully  appraised;  moreover,  what  it  may  be  expected 
to  interpret  in  the  future  has  not  been  neglected.  Genetics 
has  thrown  light,  and  a  flood  of  light,  on  heredity  and  the 
mechanism  of  inheritance. 

This  is  a  very  different  thing  from  throwing  light  on 
transformism,  which  is  evolution.  Mayr  has  shown  that 
the  systematic  zoologists,  or  the  taxonomists,  with,  of 
course,  the  paleontologists,  are  the  ones  who  have  made  the 
most  extensive  contributions  to  our  knowledge.  Whether 
they  will  continue  to  do  so  in  the  future  remains  to  be  seen. 

But  the  sum  total  of  what  is  really  new  is  not  greater 
than  the  contribution  to  knowledge  made  by  Hugo  de 
Vries  in  1901,  and  notliing  like  so  illuminating  as  the  re- 
statement of  Jordan's  Law  of  Evolution  through  Isolation 
—  which  I  am  about  to  quote  in  the  words  of  Tate  Regan. 
He  has  pointed  out  in  these  meaty  paragraphs  that  this 
isolation  might  be  geographic  or  habitudinal:  — 

This  theory  [that  is,  the  mutation  theory],  which 
explains  adaptation  as  the  result  of  a  series  of  fortunate 
accidents,  appears  to  me  to  approximate  to  the  old 
"special  creation"  theory,  and  it  was  in  opposing  this 


The  Tests  of  Evolution  243 

idea  of  great  and  sudden  transformations  that  Darwin 
wrote:  "To  admit  all  this  is,  as  it  seems  to  me,  to  enter 
into  the  realms  of  miracle  and  to  leave  those  of  sci- 
ence." The  mutation  theory  is  in  favour  with  the  genet- 
icists, who  have  found  that  definite  variations  occur 
and  are  definitely  inherited.  But  the  geneticists  are 
puzzled  to  suggest  how  these  variations  could  become 
specific  characters,  common  to  all  the  members  of  a 
species,  seeing  that  they  are  not  adaptive,  and  there- 
fore could  not  be  selected. 

Systematists  attach  little  importance  to  interspecific 
steriHty;  they  know  that  Darwin  showed  that  between 
alHed  species  there  are  all  gradations,  from  complete 
sterility  to  complete  fertility.  But  for  the  geneticists 
sterility  is  all-important  —  it  is  their  one  hope  of  pro- 
ducing the  semblance  of  a  species  —  and  they  proclaim 
that  the  event  for  which  they  are  waiting  is  the  pro- 
duction of  a  variety  which  is  sterile  with  the  parent 
form.  That  great  event,  if  and  when  it  occurs,  will 
leave  me  cold;  in  my  opinion,  it  will  have  about  as 
much  relation  to  the  orgin  of  species  as  the  occurrence 
of  albinos  has  to  the  coloration  of  arctic  animals  —  that 
is  to  say,  no  relation  whatever! 

My  own  work  on  the  structure,  classification,  and 
geographical  distribution  of  fishes  has  led  me  to  cer- 
tain conclusions.  I  believe  that  the  first  step  in  the 
origin  of  a  new  species  is  not  a  change  of  structure, 
but  the  formation  of  a  community,  either  through  lo- 
calization, geographical  isolation,  or  habitudinal  segre- 
gation. I  also  think  that  specific  characters  may  be 
grouped  as  follows:  they  are  either  {a)  useful,   {b) 


244  Naturalist  at  Large 

correlated  with  useful  characters,  {c)  due  to  the  en- 
vironment, or  {d)  the  expression  of  some  physiologi- 
cal peculiarity.  But  I  see  no  reason  for  believing  that 
they  have  originated  as  mutations. 

As  I  said  before,  we  encounter  a  multitude  of  mysteries 
in  the  study  of  evolution,  and  these  have  made  me  a  little 
bit  impatient  and  uncharitable  toward  the  atheist.  As  man's 
knowledge  of  the  mysteries  expands,  their  magnitude  in- 
creases and  leaves  the  honest  and  candid  man  very  humble 
in  mind. 

I  don't  see  why  anyone  should  gag  at  the  cousinship 
of  man  and  the  apes  —  the  relationship  is  too  distant.  Rather 
let  him  consider  with  awe  the  majesty  of  orderliness  which 
to  the  humble-minded  is  the  subject  most  to  be  respected 
within  man's  ken.  Like  the  concept  of  infinity  in  time  or 
space,  this  matter  passes  our  understanding. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

Whales 


F 


OR  a  student  primarily  of  reptiles  I  have  had  a  singu- 
lar number  of  opportunities  to  add  interesting  species  of 
whales  to  the  collection  of  the  Museum. 

The  first  occasion  was  in  my  twenty-third  year  when 
I  read  in  a  local  paper  that  a  small  whale  had  come  ashore 
at  North  Long  Branch,  New  Jersey.  My  family  were 
spending  the  summer  at  Monmouth  Beach  that  year  and 
I  purchased  a  large  butcher  knife  and  walked  to  North 
Long  Branch.  I  found  that  the  little  whale  was  being  ex- 
hibited and  that  its  owner  would  continue  in  this  way  to 
capitalize  his  find  until  the  Board  of  Health  intervened. 
The  Board  did  intervene  a  few  days  later  and  I  proceeded, 
having  had  the  whale  photographed,  to  cut  off  its  head. 
I  wanted  to  rough  out  the  whole  skeleton,  but  cutting  off 
the  head  was  a  fearful  ordeal  and  I  got  myself  covered 
with  such  stinking  gurry  that  I  was  ashamed  to  enter  the 
house  when  I  got  home.  I  packed  the  skull  in  a  barrel  with 
salt  and  ice  and  shipped  it  to  the  Museum  in  Cambridge. 
When  I  got  back  to  Cambridge  I  asked  where  it  was  and 
was  gruffly  told  by  my  superior  that  it  had  been  sent  to 
the  North  Cambridge  dump.  I  went  up  there  and  by  great 
good  luck  found  it,  although  it  had  been  somewhat  dam- 
aged by  dogs.  Nevertheless,  enough  remained  for  my  friend. 
Dr.  Glover  Allen,  to  write  an  important  paper  on  the  find 
—  for  the  species  represented  was  a  very  rare  one. 


246  Naturalist  at  Large 

My  next  adventure  came  a  few  years  later  during  a 
Christmas  vacation  when  I  was  in  Banana  Creek  near  Cape 
Canaveral.  I  was  fishing  with  Dr.  Charles  G.  Weld  in  his 
launch  when  we  came  on  a  porpoise  that  had  got  into 
shallow  water.  We  killed  it  with  a  shotgun.  I  have  the 
tanned  skin  and  skull  of  that  beast  in  the  Museum  still. 
We  both  tried  it  for  breakfast,  but  it  tasted  like  cotton 
waste  soaked  in  cod-liver  oil.  Not  even  the  liver  was  to 
our  minds  in  the  least  edible. 

The  next  chance  to  collect  cetaceans  that  were  really 
useful  in  the  Museum  came  right  at  Beverly  Farms  when 
two  beaked  whales  chasing  fish  on  a  falling  tide  got 
stranded  quite  near  where  we  live  in  summer.  Their  un- 
cannily human  groans,  deep  sobbing  sounds,  were  audible 
half  a  mile  away,  and  had  kept  the  neighbors  uneasily 
awake.  A  local  fisherman  came  along  before  I  did,  made 
them  fast  with  ropes  to  trees  on  the  shore,  and  carved  his 
initials  on  their  hides,  thus  under  Massachusetts  laws  mak- 
ing them  his  own.  He  neglected  to  do  anything  with  them 
for  several  days,  however,  and  I  got  authority  from  the 
Board  of  Health  to  take  them  over.  I  got  a  tug  and  towed 
them  to  Ten  Pound  Island  in  Gloucester  Harbor.  There, 
with  the  advice  of  my  friend  Mr.  Wilham  McGinnes,  then 
Mayor  of  Gloucester,  and  with  the  help  of  some  fishermen 
whom  he  knew,  we  cut  each  whale  into  two  pieces  —  no 
small  task,  for  these  were  big  animals,  eighteen  to  twenty 
feet  long.  Luckily  there  was  a  tug  in  Gloucester  Harbor 
that  had  a  powerful  crane  on  board.  Thus  we  were  able 
to  pick  up  the  pieces,  load  them  into  trucks,  and  take  them 
to  a  rendering  plant  in  Danvers.  In  this  way  it  was  possible 
to  save  both  skeletons  complete  and  these  we  have  in  the 


Whales  247 

Museum.  I  may  add  that,  here  again,  this  whale  adventure 
was  odoriferous  in  the  extreme. 

Now  to  Virginia  Beach  in  the  autumn  of  1938. 1  walked 
to  get  tlie  mail,  from  our  house  at  the  Sand  Bridge  Club. 
The  mailman  drove  down  the  beach  every  other  day, 
leaving  our  mail  in  a  box  on  top  of  a  high  post.  Walking 
about  and  waiting  for  the  mailman's  arrival,  I  saw  a  black 
object  near  the  surf.  It  was  a  pygmy  sperm  whale.  This 
was  small  enough  so  that  we  could  haul  it  right  to  the  Club 
House,  ice  it,  and  send  it  to  Cambridge.  It  had  a  deep  cut 
across  the  back  of  its  neck.  I  am  quite  sure  it  was  killed  by 
getting  too  near  the  propeller  of  a  steamer. 

The  next  year,  almost  to  a  day,  I  walked  down  the  same 
road  with  my  young  friends  Barbara  and  WilUam  Schevill 
and  was  telling  them  about  finding  the  little  whale.  We 
had  no  sooner  reached  the  mailbox  than  I  saw  a  black 
object  in  about  the  same  position  and  then,  looking  down 
the  beach,  saw  another.  Since  one  of  these  individuals, 
which  both  turned  out  to  be  pygmy  sperm  whales,  was  ob- 
viously immature,  we  concentrated  on  the  adult  specimen, 
which  we  found  was  a  lactating  female  with  an  embryo 
about  a  foot  long  in  her  uterus.  Both  of  these  whales  had 
been  killed  by  a  sharp  cut  across  the  back  of  the  head  in 
exactly  the  same  way  as  the  one  we  found  the  previous 
year.  After  finding  these  two  Uttle  whrJes,  it  suddenly  oc- 
curred to  me  that  just  the  day  before  from  the  top  of  a 
near-by  sand  dune  I  had  watched  the  southward  passage 
of  a  large  flotilla  of  torpedo  boats  which  had  passed  out 
from  the  Virginia  Capes  southward  bound.  I  suspect  it  was 
one  of  these  that  killed  them. 


248  Naturalist  at  Large 

Thus  we  know  that  this  rare  little  solitary  whale,  which 
has  turned  up  here  and  there  all  over  the  world  (our  only- 
previous  specimen  in  this  Museum  was  from  New  Zea- 
land), evidently  has  a  way  of  following  behind  ships  in- 
stead of  preceding  them  as  is  the  usual  practice  for  playing 
dolphins.  Moreover,  evidently  the  young  of  the  previous 
year  follows  the  mother  and  continues  to  suckle  until  the 
young  of  the  next  generation  is  a  well-grown  embryo. 

The  last  of  these  events  I  am  going  to  describe  in  my 
daughter  Julia's  own  terms:  — 

Mother,  my  sister  Louisa,  Pa  and  I  were  in  Virginia 
for  our  annual  bout  of  duck  shooting.  On  this  par- 
ticular occasion  we  were  shooting  some  beach  blinds 
owned  by  our  cousin  whose  property  adjoins  our 
Sand  Bridge  marsh.  To  get  to  Barbour's  Hill  (a  seven- 
teen-foot elevation  above  sea  level)  one  drives  about 
eight  miles  along  the  beach.  This  in  itself  is  a  treach- 
erous pastime  at  best  and  not  made  any  less  so  by  our 
vehicle  —  an  old  station  wagon  whose  superstructure 
is  rusted  away  and  whose  brakes  and  lights  have  long 
since  departed. 

We  had  an  excellent  time  at  Barbour's  Hill,  wangled 
our  limit  in  geese  and  ducks  and  started  home.  The 
beach  buggy  was  laden  down  with  our  loot  and  our- 
selves. We  proceeded  slowly,  careful  to  avoid  the 
stumps  of  petrified  trees  and  ribs  of  wrecked  sailing 
ships.  Occasionally  a  marsh  hog  would  eye  us  over  the 
edge  of  a  sand  dune  and  then  run  hastily  away.  We 
must  have  been  a  terrifying  sight.  The  sea  was  quite 
rough  and  waves  rolled  in  fast  —  breaking  in  a  jumbly 
mass. 


Whales  249 

Suddenly  Pa,  from  his  precarious  perch  on  the  box, 
let  out  a  yell.  After  a  few  seconds,  Patsy,  our  driver, 
brought  our  junk  heap  to  a  standstill.  This  had  to  be 
effected  by  coaxing  the  gear  into  reverse,  so  that  we 
rolled  a  few  hundred  feet  before  coming  to  a  full 
halt.  Pa  leapt  out  and  ran  back  along  the  beach.  I  must 
say  he  was  an  odd-looking  figure  —  his  hip  boots  bog- 
ging down  in  the  loose  sand. 

We  tried  to  be  very  casual  but  we  were  convinced 
that  Pa  had  lost  his  mind.  Finally,  he  arose  from  the 
deep,  dragging  a  heavy  object  after  him.  It  was  a  large 
and  very  dead  porpoise  which  Pa  had  firmly  by  the 
tail.  He  eased  back  to  the  beach  buggy  dragging  his 
booty  and  looking  for  all  the  world  like  the  40-fathom 
codfish  advertisement.  He  asked  us  to  alight  and  view 
his  prize,  which  we  did.  We  tried  to  look  appreciative. 

Then  we  were  asked  to  hold  the  beast  in  our  laps 
while  we  continued  our  way  homeward.  I  kept  think- 
ing how  remarkable  it  was  that  Pa  had  seen  anything 
floating  in  that  surf,  and,  having  seen  it,  cared  enough 
to  chase  into  the  water,  get  wet,  and  then  give  his 
family  the  doubtful  pleasure  of  carrying  it  home.  It 
must  have  been  something  rare,  but  it  certainly  looked 
ordinary,  this  critter  whose  aroma  circled  around  us 
like  a  thick  fog. 

This  find,  however,  turned  out  to  be  a  specimen  of  a 
Prodelphinus,  one  of  the  swift  racers  of  the  ocean  of  which 
we  had  no  specimen  in  the  Museum.  We  were  able  to  ship 
it  entire,  as  it  was  cold  weather,  and  we  could  have  draw- 
ings made  as  well  as  a  complete  skeleton  prepared  after  it 
arrived  safely  in  Cambridge. 


CHAPTER  XXII 

Latin  America 


I 


HAVE  long  felt  that  I  owed  a  debt  of  gratitude  to 
many  friends  in  Latin  America.  When  my  old  friend 
Wilson  Popenoe,  who  is  building  the  Pan-American  Agri- 
cultural School  for  Mr.  Samuel  Zemurray  and  the  United 
Fruit  Company  near  Tegucigalpa,  said,  "You  should  write 
up  your  experiences  in  Central  and  South  America,"  I 
made  up  my  mind  to  do  just  that.  Experiences  of  travel 
in  South  America,  however,  have  inspired  books  of  all 
sorts  —  old  books  mostly  good,  and  modern  books,  a  few 
good,  more  indifferent,  and  many  not  worth  the  paper 
they  are  written  on. 

I  am  going  to  write  mostly  of  friendship,  not  scenery. 
Suppose  you  had  been  with  me  when  our  steamer  anchored 
in  the  lovely  harbor  of  Bahia  in  Brazil.  I  was  delighted 
with  the  scene,  as  were  my  family,  but  was  still  more 
pleased  when  a  handsome  young  man  stepped  up  to  me 
and  said,  "I  am  Afranio's  brother."  Afranio  do  Amaral  was 
first  my  student  and  then  one  of  my  warmest  friends.  I  did 
not  then  know  that  his  brother  was  President  of  the  State 
of  Bahia.  He  was  the  soul  of  courtesy  and  hospitality.  We 
saw  everything  from  the  superb  tiles  in  the  Church  of 
Sao  Francisco  to  the  market  where  you  can  purchase  any- 
thing from  a  marmoset  to  a  mango.  To  my  dying  day  I 
shall  remember  a  red  snapper  cooked  with  a  hot  tomato 
sauce  as  one  of  the  most  delicious  dishes  I  have  ever  tasted. 


Latin  America  251 

Eventually  we  arived  in  Rio,  where  Afranio  met  us  with 
Lucia,  his  lovely  young  wife,  and  his  children.  It  was  a 
joy  to  be  together  again,  after  several  years.  Rosamond 
and  the  girls  stayed  in  Rio,  but  Afranio  and  I  went  on 
to  Sao  Paulo.  He  was  then  Director  of  the  Serum  Therapeu- 
tic Institute  at  Butantan,  the  "Snake  Farm"  to  tourists, 
and  of  course  we  had  a  thousand  things  to  talk  over  to- 
gether; my  old  correspondent  Oliverio  Pinto  of  the  Mu- 
seu  Paulista  to  see;  and  Lucia's  family  to  salute,  the 
Assumpcaos,  whose  lovely  home  it  was  a  privilege  indeed 
to  visit. 

Years  before  when  we  were  first  in  Rio  I  met  Dr.  Or- 
ville  A.  Derby,  then  head  of  the  Geological  Survey  of 
Brazil.  It  was  in  his  office  that  I  first  realized  that  there 
were  vertebrate  fossils  to  be  found  in  Brazil.  This  fact  lay 
in  the  back  of  my  mind  for  years  until  I  had  the  good 
fortune  to  play  a  small  part  in  persuading  Professor  Alfred 
Romer  to  come  to  Cambridge  from  the  University  of  Chi- 
cago. We  soon  began  to  plot  a  Brazihan  expedition  to  hunt 
fossils.  He  had  exactly  the  right  man  to  lead  it:  Llewellyn 
Price,  an  artist  to  his  finger  tips,  a  splendid  field  man  with 
a  great  nose  for  a  fossil,  and,  above  all,  born  and  raised  in 
Brazil.  We  teamed  him  up  with  Dr.  T.  E.  White,  later 
to  be  my  companion  in  crime  in  the  fossil  fields  of  Florida, 
and  down  they  went  to  get  a  magnificent  collection  of 
Rhynchosaurs,  Cynodonts,  and  Dicynodonts,  all  primitive 
reptiles,  many,  many  millions  of  years  old.  They  have 
bones  as  heavy  as  a  small  rhinoceros:  the  remains  of  one 
of  them  would  come  to  several  hundred  pounds. 

One  of  the  best  of  these  skeletons,  prepared  for  mount- 
ing, we  sent  back  to  Brazil  as  a  good-will  offering,  and 


252  Naturalist  at  Large 

with  it  went  Price,  who  now  has  been  in  Brazil  for  sev- 
eral years,  the  very  best  sort  of  good-will  envoy. 

Harvard  and  Brazil  have  long  been  allies.  On  the  wall 
of  my  office  hangs  a  picture  inscribed,  "To  Mrs.  Agassiz 
from  Dom  Pedro  d' Alcantara,  Boston,  June  14,  1876,"  a 
souvenir  of  the  Emperor  of  Brazil's  visit  to  Mrs.  Agassiz 
after  the  Professor's  death  and  after  the  Emperor  had  more 
or  less  voluntarily  laid  down  the  Royal  Crown. 

The  Botanical  Garden  of  Rio  is  comparable  only  to 
that  of  Buitenzorg  in  Java.  In  some  respects,  however,  it 
is  more  spectacular  and  more  instructive,  for  it  is  divided 
into  sections,  one  growing  the  xerophytic  vegetation  of 
the  deserts  of  Ceara,  another  filled  with  the  incredible 
forest  trees  of  Amazonia,  a  third  with  orchids,  a  fourth 
with  enormous  palms,  and  so  on.  Dr.  Campos  Porto  was 
Director  when  last  I  was  there,  and  his  first  words  were  to 
ask  about  the  health  of  my  beloved  colleague  Oakes  Ames. 
They  had  botanized  together  years  before  orchid  hunting, 
for  the  Ames  herbarium  of  orchids  is  probably  the  richest 
and  best  organized  in  existence. 

We  have  pleasant  recollections  of  Montevideo.  When 
first  we  were  in  Buenos  Aires,  Florentino  Ameghino  was 
alive.  And  it  was  of  him  that  Dr.  W.  B.  Scott  wrote:  — 

He  and  his  wife  lived  like  hermits  in  a  corner  of  his 
large  house,  all  the  rest  of  which  was  given  up  to  his 
shop  and  his  collections.  Every  penny  which  he  could 
scrape  up  was  devoted  to  the  publication  of  his  papers 
and  to  keeping  his  brother  Carlos  at  work  collecting 
fossils  in  Patagonia.  In  the  history  of  science  I  do  not 
know  a  finer  example  of  courage  and  devotion  under 


Latin  America  253 

the  most  adverse  circumstance.  The  long  brave 
struggle  was,  at  length,  fitly  rewarded  by  Ameghino's 
appointment  to  the  Directorship  of  the  National  Mu- 
seum at  Buenos  Aires,  a  post  which  he  held  to  the  end 
of  his  life. 

Santiago  de  Chile  was  and  is  a  superb  city,  the  snow- 
capped Andes  in  plain  view  and  the  lovely  little  park, 
called  the  Cerro  Santa  Lucia,  to  stroll  in  during  the  late 
afternoon.  I  wonder  whether  the  old  sign  over  the  en- 
trance to  the  Protestant  Cemetery  there  is  still  in  place. 
The  inscription  ran  something  Uke  this,  "Here  lie  interred 
those  who,  unable  to  enter  Heaven,  were  not  welcome  in 
Hell."  If  the  Good  Neighbor  Policy  works  both  ways, 
and  I  believe  it  does,  this  sign  has  probably  long  since 
disappeared. 

General  Kilpatrick,  an  old  friend  of  my  father,  had 
married  a  Chilean  lady,  a  Valdivieso.  The  widow  was  still 
alive  when  we  were  in  Santiago  for  the  Scientific  Congress 
in  1908.  She  was  a  direct  descendant  of  Ponce  de  Leon, 
knew  everybody  in  Santiago,  and,  though  we  were  enter- 
tained officially  as  delegates,  she  showed  us  many  charm- 
ing attentions  which  opened  up  the  life  of  a  most  polite 
and  cultivated  society. 

It  is  worth  a  trip  to  Peru  if  only  to  hear  the  Peruvians 
speak  Spanish.  They,  with  the  people  of  Colombia  and 
of  Costa  Rica,  do  perfect  justice  to  the  stately  measures  of 
that  most  majestic  and  sonorous  of  all  the  languages.  I  say 
this  praying  that  my  Brazilian  friends  will  not  be  furious 
at  the  implied  slur  on  Portuguese.  Whenever  I  read  a  bit 


254  Naturalist  at  Large 

of  Camoens  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  I  have  been  unjust 
to  the  language  of  Brazil. 

My  daughter  Mary  and  her  husband,  Alfred  Kidder  II, 
have  traveled  far  and  wide  digging  for  prehistoric  pottery, 
first  in  Venezuela  where  I  was  able  to  pass  them  on  to  old 
friends,  then  in  Honduras  where  the  farmers  and  officials 
of  the  United  Fruit  Company  showed  them  many  courte- 
sies while  they  worked  in  the  prehistoric  cemeteries  near 
Lake  Yohoa  and  the  Ulua  River.  Latterly  they  have  con- 
centrated on  Peru  where  Dr.  Julio  C.  Telio,  once  here  at 
Harvard  and  an  old  friend  of  mine,  and  his  colleagues 
have  made  every  day  of  their  two  long  visits  golden  days 
indeed,  as  witness  my  daughter's  published  diary.  No 
Lmiits  but  the  Sky,  which  has  been  praised  by  others  than 
her  affectionate  father. 

I  have  been  asked  time  and  time  again  what  railroad 
ride  I  have  enjoyed  above  all  others.  This  question  is  a 
o^ood  deal  lil^e  "Which  is  the  most  beautiful  harbor  in 
the  world?"  —  something  which  has  been  widely  discussed 
since  the  beginning  of  time.  But  for  my  part  I  don't  think 
there  is  any  scenery  so  lovely  as  that  which  meets  the  eye 
when  the  train  turns  sharply  inland  after  leaving  Siquirres 
in  Costa  Rica  and  begins  to  climb  up  to  the  central  high- 
lands on  a  road  that  clings  precariously  to  a  little  shelf 
beside  the  roaring  Reventazon  River.  The  forest  along  the 
lower  Motagua  in  Guatemala  is  perhaps  equally  fine  and 
varied,  but  in  Costa  Rica  the  river  pitches  down  much  more 
steeply.  As  you  mount  upward  there  are  frequently  long- 
distance scenes  down  the  valley  toward  the  sea  which  are 
ineffably  lovely. 


Latin  America  255 

Costa  Rica  is  one  of  the  most  charming  of  all  lands.  In 
addition  to  breath-taking  scenery  in  all  directions,  it  has  a 
dehghtful,  cultivated,  intellectual  society  in  its  capital.  I 
may  add  also  that  many  of  the  ladies  are  singularly  lovely. 

With  horses  and  guides  kindly  lent  us  by  my  friend 
Charles  Lankester,  who  plants  coffee  at  Las  Concavas, 
Ned  Hammond  and  I  once  made  a  trip  to  the  summit  of 
the  volcano  of  Irazti  and  spent  a  couple  of  nights  camped 
just  below  the  cinder  cone.  It  was  possible  to  walk  to  the 
top  of  the  mountain,  with  the  cinders  crackling  with  frost 
underfoot,  and  as  daylight  came  to  stand  and  watch  the 
sunrise.  The  clouds  were  far  below  us.  At  last  we  could 
see  the  blue  sea  of  the  Atlantic  far  away  and  over  10,000 
feet  below.  Far  and  wide  in  every  direction  the  moun- 
tain tops  stuck  up  like  islands  in  the  deep  white  sea  of  fog. 
In  a  few  hours  the  fog  all  burned  away  to  reveal  the  in- 
credible beauty  of  the  valleys  of  this  crumpled-up  land. 
Nothing  in  the  mountain  forest  is  more  breath-taking  than 
the  orchids,  which  are  simply  beyond  description.  Imagine 
a  mass  of  corsage  Cattleyas  ensconced  on  a  branch  directly 
below  you  as  you  peer  down  some  little  mountain  canyon, 
perhaps  a  hundred  blossoms,  a  flaming  mass  of  scarlet, 
which  would  fill  a  bushel  basket. 

I  remember  every  hour  of  my  considerable  number  of 
visits  to  Costa  Rica  with  lasting  pleasure.  The  mainland 
of  Central  America  has  conspired  to  treat  me  very  kindly, 
something  which  the  waters  off  its  coast  have  usually  quite 
reversed.  I  never  in  my  life  have  suffered  more  acutely 
than  in  going  from  port  to  port  on  those  two  little  sub- 
marine chasers,  the  Wild  Duck  and  the  Victor,  of  doleful 
memory.  I  appreciate  the  kindness  of  the  United  Fruit 


256  Naturalist  at  Large 

Company  in  allowing  me  to  use  them,  but  of  all  the  mo- 
tions producing  seasickness,  from  which  I  have  suffered 
acutely  all  my  life,  nothing  was  ever  contrived  in  the 
shape  of  a  boat  which  could  touch  these  two  craft  for 
unspeakable  gyrations. 

Guatemala  to  me  means  the  Popenoes.  They  live  in  the 
house  about  which  Louis  Adamic  wrote  the  book  called 
The  House  in  Antigua.  Do  read  it.  You  will  then  know 
exactly  what  I  mean.  And  to  me  Guatemala  also  means  the 
colorful  Indian  cities  and  towns,  with  their  individual  and 
characteristic  costumes;  the  sumptuous  ruins  of  Quirigua 
in  their  setting  of  one  of  the  finest  bits  of  high  rain  forest 
anywhere  to  be  found;  and  delightful,  lazy  week  ends  spent 
at  the  hospital  at  Quirigua  with  Dr.  Macphail,  whose  cook 
made  what  always  seemed  to  me  the  best  tortillas  in  all 
Central  America.  What  Dr.  Macphail  has  done  in  alleviat- 
ing human  suffering  in  a  land  where  skilled  medical  care 
is  not  widely  distributed  could  only  be  handled  justly  in 
a  book  devoted  to  the  men  in  charge  of  the  far-flung  hos- 
pitals of  the  United  Fruit  Company. 

It  is  curious  how  a  single  person  or  a  single  object  re- 
calls a  whole  concatenation  of  scenes  and  personalities. 
Mention  dancing-girl  orchids  and  the  market  at  Salvador 
flashes  to  mind.  You  can  buy  these  gemlike  flowers, 
in  armfuls  of  long  sprays,  for  a  few  cents  and  then  your 
mind  jumps  to  Madam  Duenas  and  her  wonderful  collec- 
tion of  pottery  to  whom  and  to  which  Warren  and  Irene 
Robbins  introduced  us.  Warren  was  our  Minister  to  Sal- 
vador when  the  Utoivana  stopped  to  bring  mangosteen 


Latin  America  257 

trees  from  the  Canal  Zone  to  Don  Felix  Chaussay,  then 
Minister  of  Agriculture,  who  was  extremely  anxious  to 
introduce  this  fruit  into  his  country.  I  hope  they  throve 
and  are  bearing  now. 

While  the  colorful  Indians  have  about  disappeared  in 
Salvador  they  still  remain  in  Guatemala,  each  Indian  city 
having  its  different  and  attractive  costume.  The  extraordi- 
narily interesting  religious  observances  are  perplexing  and 
difficult  indeed  to  study  unless  you  speak  one  of  the  Mayan 
languages,  as  I,  unfortunately,  do  not.  I  have  seen  sand 
paintings  as  elaborate  as  anything  which  the  Navajos  ever 
made,  on  the  floor  of  the  Church  at  San  Antonio  de  Aguas 
Calientes. 

Why  North  Americans  have  been  so  slow  in  learning 
the  charms  of  Latin  America  is  difficult  to  explain.  I  sup- 
pose it  is  because  of  the  language  barrier.  North  Americans 
are  generally  a  unilingual  people.  Cultivated  South  Amer- 
icans are  bilingual  but  their  second  language  has  been 
French.  Most  North  American  college  executives  a  few 
decades  ago  rather  dreaded  the  advent  of  Latin-American 
students.  They  usually  had  too  much  money  and  too  few 
morals.  The  truth  was  the  best  of  them  went  to  study  in 
France.  Now  this  is  all  changed  and  since  I  have  served  on 
the  Latin-American  Board  of  the  John  Simon  Guggenheim 
Memorial  Foundation  I  have  had  to  do  with  the  bringing 
to  America  of  a  number  of  most  outstanding  young  schol- 
ars. It  has  been  sad,  at  times,  to  see  the  way  these  young 
men,  after  they  have  completed  their  studies,  have  been 
grabbed  up  and  given  positions  in  American  institutions, 
when  the  purposes  of  the  Foundation  would  have  been 


258  Naturalist  at  Large 

better  served  had  they  returned  to  replenish  the  faculties 
of  their  native  lands. 


Americans  at  last  are  beginning  to  learn  of  the  joy  of 
traveling  in  Mexico.  The  new  highway  has  played  some 
part,  but  the  interchange  of  students,  North  Americans 
who  have  attended  the  summer  school  at  the  University 
of  Mexico,  and  the  reverse  process,  have  played  a  part 
which  it  is  quite  impossible  to  exaggerate  in  building  up 
the  friendliness  which  now  exists  and  which  should  have 
existed  for  many  years. 

I  remember  in  particular  a  trip  we  took  to  Mexico  in 
April  193 1,  while  our  ship,  the  Utowana,  lay  at  anchor  in 
Mazatlan  Bay.  My  wife,  my  daughter  Mary,  and  I  got  a 
horse  and  wagon  and  set  out  after  fresh  fruits  and  vege- 
tables. 

We  were  some  dozen  miles  inland  when  Rosamond 
spotted  a  tree  laden  with  Hmes.  There  was  a  small  dusty 
roadside  general  store  near  by  and  I  asked  the  storekeeper 
if  he  owned  the  lime  tree.  He  said  yes.  I  asked  if  he  would 
sell  us  some  Hmes.  He  said  no.  I  was  surprised,  as  he  didn't 
look  very  prosperous  and  I  thought  he  would  seize  the 
opportunity  to  do  a  little  business.  Not  so.  While  we 
talked  and  talked,  as  one  does  in  Mexico,  I  learned  that 
the  lime  tree  was  very  prickly,  that  picldng  limes  was 
tiresome  and  dreary,  and  if  he  picked  them  he  feared  he 
would  have  to  charge  more  for  them  than  we  were  likely 
to  pay,  and  so  on.  Finally  we  agreed  to  pick  them  our- 
selves and  then  set  a  price  after  we  had  seen  how  many 
we  secured. 

Down  the  road  came  a  small  bunch  of  scrubby  cattle, 


Latin  America  259 

little  more  than  calves,  and  behind  them  trudged  a  bare- 
foot Indian  boy,  his  white  cotton  shirt  hanging  out  over 
his  white  cotton  pants,  and  an  enormous  sombrero  on  his 
head.  Every  once  in  a  while  he  flicked  at  something  with 
Ills  long-lashed  whip  and  then  stooped  and  picked  the 
something  up  and  put  it  in  his  pocket.  It  was  not  until  he 
got  quite  near  us  that  I  saw  what  he  was  doing.  He  was 
killing  lizards  with  a  skillfully  directed  snap  of  his  whip- 
lash. This,  of  course,  was  an  answer  to  prayer.  I  asked  him 
why  he  wanted  them  and  he  said  to  feed  his  mother's  cats. 
I  offered  him  a  dime  and  looked  over  his  gamebag.  Some 
of  the  lizards  were  badly  smashed.  Others  were  not.  I 
picked  out  the  best  and  thanked  him.  One  of  them  turned 
out  to  be  a  new  species  which  I  named  after  our  good 
ship,  Anolis  utowanae.  I  had  already  named  for  her  owner 
a  beautiful  new  form  of  the  same  genus  from  Ruatan  Island 
in  Honduras. 

Cuba  has  been  almost  a  second  home  to  me  and  I  feel 
free  to  visit  my  Cuban  friends'  houses  and  discuss  with 
them  their  most  intimate  problems  in  the  frankest  way. 
Dear  Don  Carlos  de  la  Torre  is  an  old  friend  indeed  and 
to  his  younger  satellite  I  almost  feel  in  loco  parentis.  This 
very  morning  I  received  a  letter  from  one  dear  boy,  who 
writes  me:  — 

I  do  not  remember  if  I  ever  told  you  that  I  was  en- 
gaged. I  feel  badly  not  to  have  let  you  know.  We 
are  going  to  be  married  in  December.  I  would  have 
liked  very  much  to  wait  until  your  next  trip  south  in 
order  to  have  you  stand  as  testigo  but  because  of  the 
war  I  doubt  if  it  could  be  arranged.  The  girl  is  a  very 


260  Naturalist  at  Large 

nice  one  and  I  have  talked  so  much  to  her  about  you 
that  she  feels  she  knows  you  as  well  as  myself. 

A  professor  in  Brazil  writes  me:  — 

I  was  awfully  pleased  to  receive  your  letter  of  June 
17th  and  want  to  thank  you  very  much  for  your  kind 
attention  in  giving  me  the  information  I  liked  to  have 
on  the  Loew  Collection.  By  reading  your  letter  I  see 
now  that  I  had  not  failed  in  my  judgment,  when  I 
understood  that  I  had  conquered  a  good  friend,  after 
your  always  remembered  visit  to  the  Oswald  Cruz 
Institute. 

And  but  a  month  ago  Dr.  Afranio  do  Amaral  writes:  — 

Dear  Tom: 

I  was  delighted  beyond  expression  to  find  on  my 
desk  the  other  day  Mary  B.'s  book,  entitled  No  Li?nits 
but  the  Sky  and  telling  about  her  and  Teddy's  travels 
in  the  Andes.  Please  thank  her  for  this  splendid  sur- 
prise and  most  appreciated  souvenir. 

How  would  you  like  to  write  Portuguese  with  that 
style? 

I  could  go  on  forever  extolling  the  charms  of  friends 
from  Cuba  and  Haiti,  from  San  Domingo  to  Patagonia. 
They  have  meant  a  great  deal  to  me.  I  have  entered  into 
their  joys  and  sorrows  and  they  into  mine,  and  I  salute 
them,  one  and  all. 

My  old  friend  Dr.  Herbert  Clark,  formerly  on  the 
Medical  Staff  of  the  United  Fruit  Company,  now  the 


Latin  America  261 

Director  of  the  Gorgas  Memorial  Laboratory  in  Panama, 
has  for  years  been  interested  in  a  snake  census,  to  find  out 
the  relative  abundance  and  the  distribution  of  the  species 
dangerous  to  man.  He  had  collected  thousands  of  heads, 
which  have  been  identified,  and  the  information  has  been 
useful  in  determining  the  procedure  connected  with  the 
preparation  of  antivenin. 

The  procedure  is  to  immunize  horses  from  which  the 
anti-venomous  serum  is  to  be  prepared  with  poison  taken 
from  the  most  abundant  dangerous  species  in  any  given 
locality.  Following  the  methods  used  in  Brazil,  the  snakes 
are  captured  and  kept  in  a  pen  and  milked  regularly  of 
their  venom,  which  quickly  dries  into  crystal  form.  This, 
diluted,  is  then  injected,  first  in  infinitesimally  small  doses, 
into  strong,  healthy  horses.  The  dosage  is  gradually  in- 
creased until  the  horse  receives  without  injury  amounts  of 
venom  which  would  normally  be  fatal  to  perhaps  a  hun- 
dred horses.  Their  tolerance  builds  up  rapidly. 

The  United  Fruit  Company,  operating  in  those  parts 
of  Central  America  where  poisonous  snakes  are  abundant, 
had  always  been  apprehensive  that  some  of  their  best  field 
men  might  be  bitten  and  lost.  There  were  other  demands 
for  serum  in  the  Canal  Zone,  in  the  Army,  and  elsewhere. 
When  Dr.  Afranio  do  Amaral  had  finished  the  work  for 
his  Doctor's  degree  here  he  generously  consented  to  help 
organize  an  Antivenin  Institute,  and  we  set  up  a  field  sta- 
tion at  the  Experiment  Station  belonging  to  the  United 
Fruit  at  Lancetilla,  Honduras.  A  commercial  organization 
in  Pennsylvania  arranged  to  produce  the  antivenin  if  we 
could  supply  the  venom. 

Wilson  Popenoe  and  Dorothy,  his  wife,  were  enthusi- 


262  Naturalist  at  Large 

astic  supporters  of  our  idea.  From  high  to  low,  not  only- 
Pop,  as  my  daughters  call  him,  but  everyone  else  con- 
nected with  the  Fruit  Company  has  always  been  cordially- 
helpful  in  developing  any  scientific  project  which  came 
to  their  attention,  and  I  felt  pleased  and  proud  to  be  able 
to  repay  some  of  the  favors  which  I  have  received  at  their 
hands.  I  knew  that  the  Snake  Farm  would  be  a  tourist  at- 
traction. Many  ships  were  entering  or  leaving  the  port  of 
Tela,  which  at  that  time  was  producing  vast  quantities  of 
fruit,  but  there  were  no  attractions  at  that  port  to  amuse 
tourists  while  the  ships  were  being  loaded. 

The  snake  pen,  built  of  galvanized  iron  for  a  non- 
climbable  wall  and  shaded  by  an  enormous  manaca  palm- 
thatched  roof,  was  of  unfailing  interest,  particularly  as  we 
had  arranged  to  have  Douglas  Marsh  or  Raymond  Stadel- 
man  milk  the  snakes  on  days  when  tourist  ships  were  in 
port.  The  natives  proved  efficient  collectors  when  they 
once  knew  what  it  was  all  about,  and  a  number  of  them 
owe  their  lives  to  serum  made  with  the  help  of  the  snakes 
they  caught.  The  fer-de-lance  was  very  common  about 
Tela.  The  snake  is  bold  and  quick  to  strike  and,  though 
active  only  by  night,  has  a  way  of  hiding  by  day  under 
the  banana  trash,  dead  leaves,  and  old  stalks,  which  nat- 
urally abound  in  any  plantation.  The  barefooted  natives 
ran  a  considerable  risk. 

We  gathered  enough  venom  to  last  for  many  years  and 
then  abandoned  the  Snake  Farm.  Now,  however,  with 
the  increase  of  miUtary  activity  in  the  Canal  Zone,  the 
demand  for  antivenin  has  suddenly  stepped  up  and  I  should 
not  be  at  all  surprised  if  we  had  to  start  collecting  snakes 
again. 


Latin  America  263 

It  was  by  rather  good  fortune  that  when  he  wanted  a 
medical  entomologist  for  the  staff  of  the  Gorgas  Memorial 
Institute,  Alexander  Graham  Bell  Fairchild,  David's  son, 
was  prepared  and  ready  for  me  to  recommend  for  the 
position.  I  felt  sure  of  this  choice,  for  not  only  had  I 
known  him  for  many  years,  but  he  passed  a  most  excel- 
lent doctor's  examination  which  I  had  attended  a  short 
time  before.  And  fortunately  Dr.  Marston  Bates,  whose 
brilliant  examination  I  had  attended  a  number  of  years 
earlier,  joined  the  staff  of  the  Rockefeller  Foundation  and 
has  distinguished  himself  in  research  concerning  the  trans- 
mission of  malaria,  first  in  Albania,  then  Egypt,  and  now 
at  Villavicencio  in  Colombia.  Marston  married  David's 
talented  daughter  Nancy  Bell,  who  was  able  to  adapt  her- 
self to  life  in  foreign  parts  as  well  as  my  daughter  Mary 
has.  All  in  all,  the  principal  gain  which  I  myself  derived 
from  the  excuse  to  visit  Honduras  on  various  occasions 
was  the  growing  intimacy  with  the  Popenoes,  whom  we 
have  warmly  adopted  as  members  of  our  family.  Dorothy 
Popenoe  died  in  Tela  and  is  buried  in  the  lovely  garden 
at  Lancetilla.  After  a  long  interval  Pop,  as  is  usual  with 
him,  proceeded  to  do  the  impossible  and  found  another 
lovely  wife  as  charming  and  talented  as  was  Dorothy. 
Helen  is  now  helping  him  build  the  Pan-American  Agri- 
cultural School  at  Zamorano,  not  far  from  Tegucigalpa, 
the  capital  of  Honduras. 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

Africa 


F, 


OR  YEARS  press  of  work  in  Cambridge  had  forced 
me  to  concentrate  on  short  journeys  to  the  West  Indies 
and  Central  America;  but  deep  in  the  background  of  the 
consciousness  of  every  real  "bug  hunter"  is  an  overwhelm- 
ing desire  to  visit  Africa,  so  that  finally  we  ended  up  — 
and  by  we  I  mean  my  wife,  Julia,  Louisa,  and  Margaret 
Porter  —  in  making  a  quick  round  trip  to  get  the  high 
lights,  and  especially  to  visit  the  Kruger  Park.  This  proved 
so  enjoyable  that  we  went  again  the  following  year,  es- 
pecially to  see  National  Parks,  as  I  have  recounted  here- 
after. 

If —  in  the  peace  to  come  — you  sail  up  the  east  coast 
of  Africa,  take  a  freight  steamer  that  stops  at  many  places 
and  does  not  hurry  in  and  out  of  the  ports  too  quickly. 
Thus  on  a  freighter  we  left  Lourengo  Marques  and  put 
in  at  Beira,  which  presents  little  of  interest  but  the  fish 
market.  There  we  picked  up  quite  a  good  collection  of 
fishes.  There  was  little  else  to  do.  Fish  markets  vary  enor- 
mously. In  some  you  find  that  the  habits  of  the  people 
are  such  that  only  a  few  special  species  are  brought  in; 
in  others,  where  the  population  is  omnivorous,  fish  may 
be  found  in  bewildering  variety.  This  was  the  case  in  Beira, 
and  while  we  had  no  idea  of  making  a  collection,  when 
Rosamond  and  I  began  to  walk  around  the  market  we 
found  such  an  extraordinary  variety  of  curious  and  in- 


Africa  265 

teresting  fishes,  and  above  all  small  species  or  young  speci- 
mens, that  we  were  able  to  get  really  a  very  fair  variety. 
Luckily,  there  was  a  good  drugstore  in  town  which  had 
formalin  for  preserving  and  some  wide-mouthed  jars,  and 
the  result  of  our  fortunate  visit  to  this  market  was  a  con- 
cise little  paper  by  our  friend  Henry  Fowler  of  the  Phila- 
delphia Academy,  who  was  glad  to  make  the  identifica- 
tions and  publish  them,  since  he  said  records  were  few  for 
this  section  of  the  African  coast. 

Then  came  Mozambique,  hoary  with  age,  and  like  an 
old,  rather  down-at-the-heel  town  of  Latin  Europe;  next 
Porto  Amelia  with  its  lovely  bay  and  Dar  es  Salaam,  mod- 
ern, obviously  built  by  Germans,  neat  and  well  laid  out. 

Zanzibar,  however,  is  the  spot  of  spots,  a  fascinating  old 
labyrinth  of  unspoiled  Arab  architecture.  No  one  can 
ever  forget  those  stunning  carved  doorways  in  what  we 
would  call  adobe  buildings,  nor  do  many  who  tread  its 
little  narrow  streets  realize  that  those  which  have  not  been 
laid  with  asphalt  in  recent  years  are  paved  with  cobble- 
stones which  came  in  the  ballast  of  ships  from  Salem.  The 
stones,  on  reaching  the  port,  were  tossed  out  and  the 
cargoes  of  ivory  and  cloves  came  on  board  and  the  thrifty 
Arabs  made  good  use  of  them. 

Here  I  played  a  trick  on  the  family.  As  we  were  walk- 
ing along  I  spotted  some  durian  fruits  hanging  in  a  stall 
in  the  market  and  I  bought  one,  said  nothing  about  it,  and 
when  we  went  to  lunch  on  the  roof  of  the  funny  Httle 
hotel  —  an  old  Arab  house  remodeled  with  its  high,  adobe 
parapets  and  much  needed  shade  in  the  form  of  an  awn- 
ing overhead,  for  the  dining  room  floor  is  also  the  roof  — 
I  prepared  a  surprise.  I  had  one  of  the  native  boys  take 


266  Naturalist  at  Large 

the  durian  and  pick  it  apart,  as  one  does  preparatory  to 
eating  it.  I  then  put  this  in  a  covered  dish  and  set  it  in  the 
middle  of  the  table.  In  due  season  the  family  arrived  and 
seated  themselves  prepared  to  complain  about  the  victuals. 
We  had  soup,  fish,  and  an  excellent  curry  which,  of  course, 
some  of  my  family  don't  like.  However,  long  before  the 
curry  stage  had  been  reached  there  were  angry  sniffings 
and  remarks  such  as,  "My,  there's  obviously  a  clogged 
drain  in  this  hotel,"  or  "I  think  it  is  a  dead  horse  in  the  next 
yard  which  should  have  been  buried  days  ago."  This  con- 
tinued until  time  for  the  dessert,  when  I  lifted  the  lid  and 
instantly  the  table  was  vacated.  One  brave  member  of  my 
party  tasted  a  sample  and  disappeared  at  once  so  that  I 
could  continue  to  clean  up  the  remains  of  the  durian  at 
leisure,  for  I  am  just  perverted  enough  to  like  this  curious 
mixture  of  peach,  garHc,  and  almonds. 

I  still  wear  the  pongee-silk  suits  which  I  had  made  to 
order  in  Zanzibar  at  one  South  African  pound  each.  I 
never  pass  the  case  in  the  Peabody  Museum  in  Salem  where 
the  old  uniforms  are  exhibited  without  marvehng  that  one 
could  wear  such  clothing  in  the  tropics  and  survive.  Imag- 
ine being  consul  in  Zanzibar  in  thick  broadcloth  covered 
with  gold  lace.  However,  thin  clothes  for  summer  are 
recent.  Our  grandfathers  wore  broadcloth  all  the  year 
round,  and  less  than  a  hundred  years  ago  British  troops 
were  shipped  to  India  with  the  same  uniforms  they  wore 
in  England. 

At  Tanga  we  motored  up  to  the  Botanical  Garden  at 
Amani  in  the  Usambara  Mountains  where  we  had  friends 
on  the  staff  of  the  institution.  We  stopped  along  the  way 
to  watch  a  column  of  army  ants  as  they  crossed  the  road 


Photo  by  M.   D.   Porter 

A  yearling  Greater  Kudu  in  the  Kruger  Park 

August  193^.  Taken  with  a  lA  FPK  universal  focus  Kodak 

at  a  distance  of  tzvelve  feet 


Africa  267 

like  a  strip  of  blackstrap  molasses  flowing  slowly  along, 
and  were  overjoyed  when  several  magnificent  black  and 
white  Colobus  monkeys  hurtling  their  way  through  the 
high  forests  jumped  across  the  road  from  one  high  tree  to 
another,  one  passing  directly  over  the  top  of  one  of  our 
motorcars.  The  forest  garden  at  Amani  is  magnificent  and 
the  Germans  who  laid  it  out  in  a  better  day  obviously 
devoted  a  great  deal  of  money  to  its  development  and  to 
the  scientific  work  which  was  carried  on  there.  The  cin- 
chona plantations  were  still  in  evidence,  though  somewhat 
overgrown,  where  the  Germans  produced  enough  quinine 
to  take  care  of  their  army  through  the  whole  long  East 
African  campaign. 

Once  we  motored  from  Tanga  to  Mombasa,  a  bad  road 
but  through  lovely  country,  and  once,  also,  we  were  long 
enough  in  Mombasa  to  go  up  to  Nairobi  and  drive  out 
to  look  across  the  Riff  Valley.  Since  that  day  I  have  al- 
ways hoped  I  might  return.  Not  only  is  the  scenery  sub- 
limely beautiful,  but  the  animals  present  a  constantly 
changing  scene.  Giraffes,  gazelles,  gnus,  hartebeests,  os- 
triches, are  constantly  before  the  eye,  and  with  luck  one 
occasionally  gets  a  glimpse  of  rhino,  hyena,  lion,  or  leop- 
ard. Indeed,  for  hours  before  you  reach  Nairobi  you 
pass  through  a  great  game  reserve  with  hundreds,  and 
often  thousands,  of  animals  always  in  view. 

Aden  is  much  more  interesting  than  most  people  realize, 
if  you  have  time  to  drive  off  the  peninsula  and  see  some 
of  the  old  Arab  towns  on  the  mainland,  and  above  all  to 
visit  the  prehistoric  tanks  —  giant  cisterns  hewn  in  the  rocks 
—  high  in  the  stony  hills  behind  Steamer  Point. 

Djibouti  is  a  hell  hole,  and  Port  Sudan,  in  the  middle 


268  Naturalist  at  Large 

of  summer,  is  warm  enough  to  talk  about  afterwards.  We 
have  been  there  several  times  and  on  one  occasion  had  a 
rather  amusing  experience.  We  had  driven  out  to  see  the 
camel  market  and  the  old  Fuzzy- Wuzzy  town  of  Suakin. 
We  returned  to  Port  Sudan  panting.  I  saw  a  sign  that  said 
"Cold  Beer."  I  sat  down  under  a  sort  of  arcade  beside  the 
dusty  square  and  while  I  proceeded  to  try  the  beer,  my 
wife  went  off  to  purchase  something  or  other.  I  heard  her 
say  to  a  portly  Greek,  "My,  what  good  English  you  speak." 
He  replied,  "I  ought  to;  I  was  born  in  Lawrence,  Massa- 
chusetts." 

If  you're  lucky  you  can  see  flamingos  in  the  salt  pans  near 
Aden  and  near  Port  Sudan  too,  and  if  your  ship  does  not 
happen  to  be  one  of  several  coming  into  Aden  on  the  same 
day,  so  that  the  birds  are  too  well  fed,  you  will  enjoy  the 
extraordinary  flight  of  Bramany  kites  which  roost  in  count- 
less multitudes  on  the  pinnacles  of  rock  about  the  town  and 
which  come  swooping  and  diving  in  graceful  flight  to  pick 
up  such  bits  of  offal  as  may  be  thrown  overboard.  I  was 
prepared  for  this  scene  and  had  all  hands  well  stocked  with 
ancient  griddle  cakes,  biscuits,  and  other  objects  which  we 
tossed  into  the  air  for  the  fun  of  seeing  the  kites  swoop  and 
catch  them  before  they  reached  the  water. 

Egypt  in  summer,  of  course,  is  pretty  warm.  On  the 
other  hand  you  have  it  to  yourself.  The  motor  ride  from 
Suez  to  Cairo  across  the  desert,  if  you  take  it  at  night,  is  far 
from  uncomfortable  and  the  Sphinx  and  the  Pyramids,  I 
think,  look  their  best  undecorated  by  tourists. 

One  summer  we  decided  to  "do  the  Holy  Land."  A 
most  comfortable  train  from  Cairo  takes  you  to  the  Canal, 
which  you  cross  at  El  Kantara.  On  the  ferry  across  the 


Africa  269 

Canal  time  passes  easily  for  a  most  extraordinary  conjurer 
stays  on  the  boat  and  goes  back  and  forth,  entertaining. 
His  principal  trick  is  to  take  a  little  chicken,  seize  it  by 
the  wings,  give  it  a  sharp  snap  and,  lo  and  behold,  he  has 
two  chickens  instead  of  one.  He  is  called  the  gilly-gilly 
man. 

On  one  occasion  we  fetched  up  across  the  Canal  and 
were  about  to  get  in  the  sleeping  car  —  in  fact  all  the  fe- 
male members  of  the  outfit  had  turned  in  and  I  was  in  the 
passport  control  office  —  when  the  officer  suddenly  spotted 
the  fact  that  my  daughter  Julia,  having  had  a  birthday  a 
few  days  before,  had  reached  an  age  when  she  should  have 
a  separate  passport  of  her  own.  This,  of  course,  it  was 
impossible  to  get  and,  after  a  lot  of  talking,  he  agreed  meta- 
phorically to  turn  the  calendar  back  a  few  days,  else  that 
trip  would  have  had  to  be  called  off. 

From  El  Kantara  the  train  runs  to  Haifa,  but  if  you  go 
to  Jerusalem  you  get  off  at  Lydda  and  take  a  branch  line. 
One  passes  in  sight  of  the  Cave  of  Macpelah  and  across  the 
stony  draw  where  David  smote  Goliath.  I  think  the  thing 
that  is  most  striking  about  Palestine  is  its  tininess.  You  can 
stand  on  the  Mount  of  Olives  and  look  down  and  see  the 
Dead  Sea  on  one  side  and  the  whole  city  of  Jerusalem 
spread  out  on  the  other.  1  am  not  going  to  discuss  visiting 
the  Holy  Places.  Some  of  the  sites  provoke  deep  emotions, 
a  real  stirring  of  the  soul,  while  others  are  quite  the  re- 
verse, and  in  summer  the  dark  covered  tunnels  which 
serve  as  streets  stink  awfully.  One  afternoon  we  drove 
down  to  the  Dead  Sea  Valley.  The  children  and  Peggy 
Porter  went  in  bathing.  We  sat  and  mopped  our  brows  for, 
in  spite  of  being  in  a  region  where  drought  is  unbroken, 


270  Naturalist  at  Large 

the  Dead  Sea  Valley  is  damp  with  the  evaporation  of  the 
surface  of  the  great  lake.  The  Jordan  River  pours  into 
the  upper  end  of  the  Dead  Sea  but  there  is  no  outlet  except 
by  evaporation.  The  temperature  in  the  valley,  surrounded 
by  broken  hills  and  1500  feet  below  the  level  of  the  sea,  in 
August  is  grotesque. 

Jacob's  Well  is  very  impressive.  How  this  rock-cut  tube 
but  a  couple  of  feet  in  diameter  and  enormously  deep  was 
ever  hollowed  out  by  primitive  man  is  hard  to  understand, 
but  made  it  was  and  down  it  reaches  to  water  which  is  cold 
and  crystal  clear.  It  is  near  Nablus,  where  the  poor,  tu- 
berculosis-ridden remnant  of  the  Samaritans  still  walk  the 
streets. 

Nazareth  is  lovely,  the  Sea  of  GaUlee  a  gem,  and  the  site 
of  Capernaum  perhaps  the  most  charming  of  all. 

Before  we  motored  down  to  Haifa  to  embark  we  went 
out  to  the  Cave  of  El  Athlit  at  the  Wadi  El  Mughara.  The 
British  Museum  has  been  digging  here  for  some  years  in 
an  extensive  cave.  A  number  of  Neanderthaloid  skeletons 
have  been  recovered,  and  picking  around  the  sides  of  the 
excavation  I  fished  out  a  jaw  of  a  red  deer  and  the  bony 
scute  which  once  underlaid  the  scale  of  a  crocodile.  This 
simply  served  to  bring  to  mind  the  fact  that  the  British 
Museum  had  found  remains  of  hippopotamus  and  a  wide 
variety  of  other  African  animals  in  this  region  which  now 
is  too  completely  bare  to  support  much  of  any  wild  life  — 
mice  and  a  few  foxes  at  best.  I  wonder  if  the  fact  that  man 
took  the  goat  into  domestication  in  this  general  area  is  not 
the  reason  for  all  this  barrenness.  Goats  and  goatherds  still 
roam  the  landscape  as  they  have  undoubtedly  been  doing 
for  several  thousand  years,  and  the  fact  that  goats  can  gnaw 


Africa  271 

the  bark  off  trees  as  well  as  destroy  herbaceous  vegetation 
is,  I  beheve,  the  probable  reason  why  so  large  a  portion 
of  the  shores  of  the  Mediterranean  basin  are  now  desert. 

John  Phillips  met  Major  Hobley  in  London  and  thus 
became  interested  in  the  Society  for  the  Preservation  of 
the  Fauna  of  the  British  Empire,  feeling  that  some  similar 
organization  should  exist  in  the  United  States.  He  and 
some  of  his  friends  established  the  American  Committee 
for  International  Wild  Life  Preservation.  This  committee 
is  active  to  this  day,  and  has  gathered  together  and  pre- 
pared much  interesting  information  concerning  the  his- 
tory and  the  causes  which  have  caused  the  extinction  of 
so  many  forms  of  animal  life.  To  know  more  in  detail 
concerning  what  had  been  done  in  South  Africa  and  to 
encourage  the  conservationists  in  that  part  of  the  world 
we  made  a  second  trip  there  in  1936.  We  sailed  from  New 
York  to  Gibraltar,  spent  about  ten  days  motoring  through 
southern  Spain,  and  then  took  the  ship  from  Gibraltar  to 
Cape  Town  via  Dakar. 

My  wife  and  I  are  fond  of  visiting  markets.  I  can  close 
my  eyes  and  see  again  the  brilliantly  costumed  Negresses 
of  Dakar,  the  Bugi  fishermen  at  Macassar  in  the  Celebes, 
the  fish  market  at  Beira  in  Portuguese  East  Africa,  and 
heaven  knows  how  many  others. 

Once  or  twice,  however,  my  conspicuous  size  has  made 
these  visits  amusing  as  well  as  interesting.  I  remember  an 
old  woman  in  the  market  in  Cienfuegos,  which  I  have 
visited  hundreds  of  times,  who  said,  "Look  at  the  walking 
ceiba."  It  was  no  compliment.  The  ceiba  is  that  enormous 
and  ungainly  tree  with  a  leprous-looking  bark  —  certainly 


272  Naturalist  at  Large 

one  of  the  most  clumsily  shaped  objects  in  the  whole 
plant  kingdom. 

On  another  occasion  at  Santiago  de  Compostela  in  Spain 
a  slatternly  old  pod  said  to  a  friend  beside  her,  "That  chunk 
of  humanity  ought  to  have  snow  on  it."  My  answer  sur- 
prised her.  I  took  my  hat  off  and  said,  "Look,  it  has."  Of 
course  she  had  no  idea  that  I  knew  Spanish  and  she  used  a 
pretty  informal  term  for  "chunk  of  humanity."  It  was  ese 
cacho  de  hombre. 

I  shall  not  elaborate  this  thesis  any  further,  for  many  of 
the  remarks  made  about  me  will  not  bear  repetition  in  any 
society,  polite  or  otherwise. 

Dakar  is  a  well-built  and  typical  colonial  tropical  city 
in  the  French  style.  It  presents  little  of  interest  except  the 
noisy  and  colorful  market  where  the  gaily  dressed  Negro 
women  look  as  if  they  all  came  from  either  Martinique  or 
Guadeloupe,  but  for  the  naturalist  there  is  a  real  high  light 
in  the  neighborhood  provided  he  has  the  good  fortune  to 
find  it  out.  We  did.  We  drove  some  miles  into  the  coun- 
try. Our  real  object  was  to  see  what  there  was  in  the  way 
of  bird  life  but  what  we  found  was  a  great  stand  of  enor- 
mous baobab  trees,  I  really  believe  the  most  wonderful 
grove  of  its  kind  in  the  world.  These  trees  must  be  ex- 
tremely old  and  most  of  them  have  been  chopped  and 
hollowed  out,  apparently  to  conserve  the  rain  water,  for 
while  this  is  a  deserty  part  of  Africa  I  take  it  that  "when 
it  rains  it  pours."  The  Arabs  say  that  the  baobab  tree,  by 
a  divine  mistake,  grows  upside  down  and  that  the  strange, 
ragged  branches  which  we  see  extending  from  its  enor- 
mous trunk  are  really  the  roots  sticking  up  in  the  air.  None 
of  the  trees  were  very  tall  but  certainly  few  of  them  were 


Africa  273 

less  than  forty-five  or  fifty  feet  in  circumference.  They 
swarmed  with  gray  hornbills,  purple  rollers,  brilliantly 
colored  bee  eaters,  and  agama  lizards.  Although  we 
had  seen  big  baobabs  at  Mombasa  and  elsewhere  in  East 
Africa,  these  giants  at  Dakar  certainly  stand  out  in  mem- 
ory. 

At  Cape  Town,  after  visiting  the  splendid  South  African 
Museum,  the  lovely  botanical  garden  at  Kirstenbosch,  the 
only  place  where  the  famous  silver  trees  are  still  to  be  seen, 
and  with  a  superb  collection  of  Proteas  and  heaths,  we 
went  again  to  the  University  at  Stellenbosch,  and  then  set 
forth  on  a  long  tour.  We  hired  a  Dodge  truck,  a  sort  of 
delivery-wagon  affair,  which  carried  all  our  goods  and 
chattels  —  as  well  as  shovels,  for  we  knew  the  roads  would 
be  bad,  some  canned  goods,  and  other  odds  and  ends. 
My  daughter  Julia  rode  in  this  with  one  of  our  Boer 
drivers  so  that  she  could  help  him  by  taking  a  turn  at  the 
wheel.  The  rest  of  us  rode  in  another  car.  Peg  helping  with 
the  driving  of  this  one.  Leaving  Cape  Town  we  started 
straight  south,  crossing  the  lovely  Sir  Laurie's  Pass,  for 
our  first  destination  was  the  Bontebok  Reserve  at  Bredas- 
dorp.  This  strikingly  beautiful  antelope,  the  bontebok, 
occurred  only  in  a  region  which  is  now  all  farming  country, 
and  thanks  to  the  Albertyn  family  some  of  them  had  been 
preserved  on  one  of  their  farms.  Finally  the  government 
bought  a  considerable  area  of  the  Strandveldt,  fenced  it,  and 
twenty-three  of  the  antelopes  were  successfully  moved 
there.  By  now  there  are  probably  two  hundred  individuals 
and  the  herd  is  thriving.  We  motored  on  to  Mossel  Bay  and 
saw  the  sea-lion  colony  on  rocks  only  a  few  miles  from 
the  city.  This  spectacular  herd  is  capable  of  development 


274  Naturalist  at  Large 

into  a  real  attraction  for  visitors.  At  present  few  people 
realize  that  it  exists  at  all.  Our  next  stop  was  Port  Elizabeth, 
where  the  ladies  of  the  party,  being  excellent  sailors, 
which  I  am  not,  went  forty  miles  offshore  to  Bird  Island, 
their  visit  luckily  coinciding  with  one  of  the  semiannual 
trips  of  the  lighthouse  tender.  They  saw  a  wonderful  show 
of  gannets,  but  only  a  few  of  the  penguins  which  they  were 
especially  hopeful  of  seeing.  The  lighthouse  keeper  told 
Rosamond  that  within  a  few  days  he  would  look  out  from 
his  house  and  instead  of  seeing  the  whole  island  snow-white 
with  gannets  they  would  all  be  gone,  and  the  penguins 
would  be  swarming  ashore  to  take  up  the  same  nesting 
ground. 

While  the  family  were  at  Bird  Island  Mr.  Herbert  Lang, 
who  had  come  from  Pretoria  to  join  us,  and  I  went  out  to 
the  Addu  Bush.  This  park,  recently  established,  shelters 
the  last  remnant  of  the  true  South  African  elephant.  There 
are  also  bush  buck,  buffalo,  and  various  small  antelope,  but 
it  was  established  especially  to  preserve  the  few  remaining 
individuals  of  the  heavy-bodied,  short-legged  cape  elephant, 
characterized  by  very  short  and  very  thick  tusks.  On  ac- 
count of  the  tendency  to  wander,  these  elephants  have  given 
a  great  deal  of  trouble,  especially  to  the  orange  growers, 
whose  groves  adjoin  their  range.  A  few  years  ago  Major 
Pretorius,  a  famous  Boer  hunter,  was  commissioned  to  kUl 
off  all  the  elephants.  He  almost  succeeded  in  doing  this  be- 
fore the  outcry  of  popular  indignation  put  a  stop  to  the 
slaughter.  The  Reserve  has  now  been  somewhat  enlarged, 
I  am  told,  and  the  elephants  are  kept  in  control  with  rockets 
and  flares  and  by  persuading  the  orange  growers  to  dump 
all  their  cull  oranges  in  a  certain  place  where  the  elephants 


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Africa  21 S 

can  go  and  feed  upon  them.  The  herd  are  holding  their 
own  now,  and  slowly  increasing  in  numbers. 

After  this  visit  we  made  a  long  tour  through  the  Knysna 
and  Tsitsikamer  Forests,  through  the  native  reservations 
in  the  Transkei,  and  through  Big  and  Little  Pongoland. 
This  gave  opportunity  to  visit  our  friend  Mr.  Hewitt, 
whose  excellent  museum  at  Grahamstown  unfortunately 
recently  has  burned  to  the  ground.  Hewitt  kindly  guided 
us  to  one  of  our  most  interesting  experiences  during  the 
whole  trip.  This  was  a  visit  to  some  rock  shelters  where 
there  were  excellent  bushmen  paintings  and  carvings  on  the 
rocks.  Major  Shortridge  showed  us  his  wonderful  mammal 
collection  at  the  Kaffrarian  Museum  at  King  William's 
Town.  He  certainly  has  one  of  the  finest  collections  if  not 
the  very  best  in  the  whole  world  of  the  small  mammals  of 
South  Africa.  At  Durban  Mr.  Chubb  described  to  us  the 
excellent  service  which  the  museum  there  is  rendering  to 
the  school  system  of  the  city,  a  complete  co-operation 
which  I  should  be  proud  to  see  copied  in  Boston,  and  which 
has  only  been  equaled,  if  not  perhaps  excelled,  by  the 
work  done  by  the  museum  at  St.  John,  New  Brunswick. 
Aided  by  grants  from  the  Carnegie  British  Empire  Trust 
the  Durban  museum  has  been  used  more  or  less  as  a 
laboratory  subject.  The  population  of  the  city  is  a  con- 
siderable mixture.  There  are  many  British,  a  very  few 
Boers,  an  enormous  Indian  population,  and  many  natives. 
By  bringing  children  in  groups  to  the  museum  and  by 
circulating  small  collections  to  the  schools  a  really  im- 
portant educational  work  has  been  built  up,  and  it  is  in- 
teresting to  see  Zulus,  in  more  or  less  conventional  costumes, 
looking  with  interest  at  the  objects  representing  the  arts 


276  Naturalist  at  Large 

and  crafts  of  their  fathers  or,  for  that  matter,  of  their 
neighbors  but  a  few  miles  away  whom  they  probably 
seldom  get  to  know  or  see. 

North  from  Durban  we  passed  through  Zululand  to 
Swaziland,  making  a  side  trip  to  spend  a  few  days  with 
Captain  Potter,  who  is  warden  of  the  Hluhluwe  and 
Umfolozi  Reserves  where  the  last  black-and-white  rhi- 
noceros are  well  protected  and  are  steadily  increasing.  The 
final  high  light  of  the  journey  of  course  was  the  opportunity 
to  revisit  the  great  Kruger  National  Park.  So  much  has  been 
written  about  this  and  it  has  been  so  often  described  that 
I  am  not  going  to  attempt  to  do  this  again.  The  Park  is  as 
large  as  the  State  of  Massachusetts,  and  swarms  with 
countless  thousands  of  animals  of  innumerable  different 
sorts.  In  a  day  driving  slowly  along  its  narrow  winding 
roads  one  may  see  elephants,  giraffe,  buffalo,  as  well  as 
antelopes  varying  from  the  enormous  eland,  as  big  as  an 
ox,  to  the  tiny  steenbok,  hardly  larger  than  a  fox  terrier. 
We  spent  a  day  or  two  in  almost  all  of  the  camps  from 
Crocodile  River  in  the  south  to  Punda  Maria  in  the  north. 
Colonel  Stevenson-Hamilton,  the  chief  ranger,  and  almost 
all  of  the  members  of  his  force  of  wardens  treated  us  with 
the  utmost  courtesy,  and  many  went  out  of  their  way  to 
make  it  possible  for  us  to  see  rare  and  unusual  animals 
which  could  only  be  found  by  knowing  exactly  the  place 
which  they  frequented,  or  the  exact  time  of  day  or  night 
when  they  were  to  be  seen.  After  passing  up  and  down  the 
whole  length  of  the  Park  we  left  the  Union  of  South 
Africa  at  Komati  Poort  and  passed  over  into  Portuguese 
East  Africa  at  Ressano  Garcia. 


Africa  277 

As  I  have  said,  my  wife  has  the  most  complete  control 
over  her  emotions  of  any  person  whom  I  have  ever  known 
and,  by  that  same  token,  is  not  given  to  sentimental  reflec- 
tions, or  even  to  reminiscence.  So  I  was  surprised  the  other 
day  when  she  said,  "You  must  remember  to  write  about 
the  time  we  met  the  locusts." 

This  was  indeed  an  extraordinary  experience  as  we  were 
leaving  the  Transvaal  at  Komati  Poort.  We  had  heard  of 
the  troubles  that  awaited  us  at  the  frontier,  so  I  directed 
our  somewhat  officious  South  African  drivers  to  stay  in 
the  cars  and  let  me  go  into  the  customhouse  and  do  the 
talking,  I  had  just  received  notice  of  my  appointment  as  a 
delegate  of  the  United  States  Government  to  the  Inter- 
national Zoological  Congress  to  be  held  at  Lisbon,  and  I 
told  the  customhouse  officers  that  I  was  going  to  give  them 
the  pleasure  of  being  the  first  to  offer  us  Portuguese  hos- 
pitality. My  Portuguese  is  by  no  means  fluent  —  indeed  it 
is  badly  mixed  with  Spanish,  which  is  for  me  almost  a  sec- 
ond mother  tongue  —  but  my  bastard  jargon  is  gUb  and  I 
can  pronounce  the  Portuguese  words  correctly  and  con- 
vincingly. My  speech  worked  hke  a  charm.  At  a  signal 
from  the  Collector  of  Customs,  the  tall,  dignified  black 
askari  swung  wide  the  barrier  over  the  road  and  we  rolled 
into  another  world. 

Komati  Poort  is  a  sleazy  little  town  of  galvanized  iron, 
mostly  unpainted.  Step  over  to  Ressano  Garcia  and  you 
step  straight  into  Portugal  —  stucco  houses  painted  in  bril- 
liant colors,  shady  arcades  about  the  plaza,  a  cafe  with  Httle 
round  tables  on  the  sidewalk,  a  bandstand,  and  wide,  clean, 
well-paved  streets  with  shade  trees.  Portuguese  East  Africa 
was  a  most  complete  eye-opener  and  the  drive  down  to  the 


278  Naturalist  at  Large 

Port  of  Lourengo  Marques  bid  fair  to  be  enjoyable  indeed. 
There  were  lots  of  birds  to  look  at.  Picturesque  natives  in 
little  groups  chattered  as  they  walked  along  the  dazzling 
highway.  We  had  progressed  about  half  an  hour  and  had 
stopped  to  gather  some  of  the  seed  pods  from  a  giant  sausage 
tree  for  planting  in  a  friend's  garden  in  Florida,  when  I 
looked  up  and  said,  "Hurry  back  to  the  car.  There's  a 
terrible  storm  brewing."  Great  black  clouds  were  rolling  up 
on  the  horizon  and  quite  obviously  headed  in  our  direction. 
So  thundergustuous  and  menacing  did  they  appear  that  we 
almost  felt  the  chill  wind  that  often  precedes  a  terrifying 
storm. 

There  was  only  one  road  and  we  had  to  make  Lourengo 
Marques  for  the  cars  to  return  to  Komati  Poort.  As  we  got 
nearer  to  the  storm,  we  marveled  that  there  was  no  light- 
ning and  no  thunder,  and  then  we  discovered  that  this 
was  no  storm  at  all  but  a  gigantic  cloud  of  locusts,  miles 
long.  In  India  and  in  Central  America  we  had  seen  swarms 
of  locusts,  but  nothing  anywhere  on  this  gigantic  scale. 
The  ground  they  passed  over  —  for  they  were  constantly 
alighting,  eating  a  little,  and  then  flying  on  —  was  com- 
pletely bare  of  vegetation,  the  scorched  earth  in  very 
sooth.  Our  wheels  slipped  and  skidded  on  the  pavement, 
which  swarmed  with  them.  Natives  with  great  flat  baskets 
gathered  them  up  for  food  and  the  storks  had  a  field  day. 
For  a  mile  or  so  we  passed  through  the  strange  semi- 
darkness  of  this  clattering,  snapping  squall  of  insects  before 
coming  out  again  into  the  brilliant  sunshine. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

In  Retrospect 

XHE  RECORD  of  the  evolution  of  a  personality,  set 
forth  objectively,  can  be  a  contribution  to  human  biology. 
I  do  not  say  that  I  can  succeed  in  being  objective,  but  I 
am  going  to  try. 

I  was  so  shy  and  timorous  up  to  the  day  of  my  marriage 
that  I  bid  fair  to  be  a  complete  recluse  all  my  life.  The 
gentle  but  firm  impact  of  my  wife's  personality  soon  be- 
gan to  change  this.  She  gave  up  dances  and  parties  and  a 
multitude  of  admirers  for  some  years  of  travel,  which  she 
certainly,  to  say  the  least,  never  yearned  for.  Gradually 
she  brought  me  around  to  a  willingness  to  meet  people  and 
even,  for  some  years,  to  do  a  considerable  amount  of  enter- 
taining until  the  devastating  blow  of  our  only  son  Wil- 
liam's death  changed  the  whole  course  of  our  lives. 

I  should  need  to  be  a  Milton  to  sum  up  Bill's  peerless 
personality.  I  can  still  sit  down  on  well-remembered  stones 
or  logs  up  in  New  Hampshire  and  feel  Bill's  presence  just 
as  if  he  were  beside  me.  He  liked  the  woods  as  I  did,  loved 
to  shoot  and  fish,  and  did  both  extraordinarily  well  for 
one  of  his  years.  He  was  built  like  a  Barbour  —  tall,  broad- 
shouldered,  and  very  powerful.  From  somewhere  he  in- 
herited a  perfect  sweetness  of  disposition  and  temper.  In 
this  respect  he  far  outshone  either  of  his  parents.  He  was 
a  fine  athlete  and  a  good  student,  and  cared  nothing  for 
hardship  or  discomfort. 


280  Naturalist  at  Large 

We  made  together  one  gorgeous  trip  alone,  up  through 
the  Kapitachuan  Lakes,  not  far  from  the  southern  end 
of  James  Bay.  He  was  eighteen  at  the  time.  We  camped 
for  several  weeks  with  some  Indians,  who,  in  no  time,  were 
devoted  to  Bill,  and  we  had  splendid  fishing.  To  cap  it  all, 
Bill  killed  a  bear,  which  was  young  enough  to  be  delicious 
to  eat;  and,  as  the  weather  was  cool,  it  kept  getting  bet- 
ter and  better  till  the  last  tiny  morsel  was  consumed.  Bill 
had  a  particularly  pleasing,  soft,  quiet,  sUghtly  husky  voice, 
and  while  he  was  incHned  to  be  somewhat  self-contained, 
nevertheless  I  have  a  feeling  that  he  would  not  unlikely 
have  become  a  clergyman.  He  always  followed  the  lesson 
at  Groton,  where  he  sang  in  the  choir,  with  his  Greek 
Testament. 

Bill  and  Mary  B.  were  in  some  respects  extraordinarily 
alike,  although  she  was,  and  still  is,  a  Uttle  golden-haired 
sprig  of  a  girl,  in  sharp  contrast  to  her  brother.  We  talked 
about  him  the  other  day  as  I  drove  with  her  to  Washington, 
where  she  went  to  join  her  husband,  who  is  on  duty  there 
with  the  Army.  It  was  a  long  and  rather  dreary  drive,  but 
made  tolerable  by  the  fact  that  we  seldom  nowadays  have 
long,  unbroken  opportunities  to  chin  and  chatter  together 
freely.  Mary  B.  also  is  one  of  the  very  few  I  know  who 
can  put  up  contentedly  with  discomfort,  as  I  think  is  well 
indicated  in  her  book. 

I  have  friends  who  have  suffered  the  same  sort  of  sor- 
row which  I  went  through  following  Bill's  death  when  he 
was  a  senior  at  Groton.  The  initial  stages  seem  completely 
unbearable,  but  gradually,  with  passing  time,  scar  tissue 
forms  over  the  open  wound;  the  memories  grow  sweeter 
and  more  precious  with  the  years,  and  finally  almost  com- 


In  Retrospect  281 

pletely  substitute  themselves  for  the  enjoyment  once  de- 
rived from  a  human  companionship.  This  has  been  a  con- 
solation to  me,  and  I  know  it  has  been  for  others. 

I  once  thought  seriously  of  shifting  over  from  being  a 
naturalist  to  becoming  a  student  of  archaeology  and  ethnol- 
ogy, but  here  my  predecessor  at  the  Agassiz  Museum,  Sam- 
uel Henshaw,  did  me  a  real  favor.  He  berated  me  so  vig- 
orously and  with  such  vituperation  for  having  any  such 
notion  that  he  really  drove  it  completely  out  of  my  head. 
He  cited  the  enormity  of  J.  W.  Fewkes's  sins  in  having 
made  just  such  a  transfer.  But  I  have  sneaked  off  on  many 
occasions  to  sit  musing  and  wishing  that  I  knew  more  about 
the  inwardness  of  archaeology,  and,  in  my  off  hours,  I  have 
read  a  great  deal  in  it. 

I  love  to  go  alone  to  the  ruins  of  Quirigua  in  Guatemala 
in  that  sumptuous  forest  setting  and  watch  a  toucan  come 
volplaning  across  the  ancient  plaza.  Those  gorgeous  stelae 
stand  now  in  solitary  grandeur  where  once  the  whole 
scene  must  have  been  thronged  with  brilliantly  costumed 
Indians. 

I  have  listened  with  breathless  enjoyment  to  the  tales 
Mary  B.  has  told  when  she  and  her  husband,  Alfred  Kid- 
der II,  have  returned  from  Barquisimeto  in  Venezuela  where 
they  have  dug  in  early  ruined  sites,  or  from  Lake  Yohoa  or 
the  Ulua  River  Valley  in  Honduras  where  they  found 
not  only  buildings  of  the  early  Mayan  Empire  but  burials 
and  superb  polychrome  pottery  as  well.  I  followed  with 
feelings  of  mingled  envy  and  wrath  their  visits  to  the  high- 
lands of  Peru  and  BoUvia  where  they  worked  for  many 
months;  envy  at  the  success  of  their  archaeological  labors 


282  Naturalist  at  Large 

and  wrath  at  the  stories  of  the  animal  life  which  they  saw 
but  which  they  had  not  the  means  or  the  time  to  collect 
for  the  Museum. 

It  is  always  a  question  whether  archaeological  monu- 
ments are  more  spectacular  on  their  native  heath  or  when 
delivered  into  captivity.  I  believe  it  is  a  blessing  that  that 
high  spidery  trestle  bridge  on  which  the  railroad  has  to 
cross  to  Guatemala  City  was  not  sufficiently  strong  to  al- 
low the  Quirigua  monuments  to  be  transferred  to  the  Capi- 
tol. They  are  superb  in  their  original  setting.  Now  they 
are  safe  in  situ  for  all  time,  thanks  to  Dr.  Alfred  Kidder 
of  the  Carnegie  Institution,  and  the  co-operation  of  the 
United  Fruit  Company  which  owns  the  land  on  which  they 
stand.  Some  day  I  hope  the  remains  of  the  buildings  can 
be  pointed  up  and  saved  from  further  disintegration  as 
has  been  done  at  Copan  in  Honduras,  where  I  have  never 
been,  or  at  Xochicalco  in  Mexico,  where  I  saw  the  wonder- 
ful Teocalli  with  its  frieze  of  plumed  serpents  in  19 lo. 

I  was  never  fitted  to  be  a  teacher,  but  Mr.  Lowell  gently 
and  firmly  led  me  to  a  point  where  I  gave  a  series  of  Lowell 
Lectures.  These  appeared  in  book  form.  The  book  went 
through  two  editions  and  sold  much  better  in  England 
than  it  did  in  America.  For  a  while  I  was  much  sought  for 
as  a  speaker  describing  our  travels,  but  that  was  in  a  day 
when  people  traveled  less  widely  and  less  easily  than  they 
do  now.  I  even  reached  a  point  where  I  made  a  speech  on 
Prize  Day  at  Groton  School,  another  at  the  dedication  of 
the  new  Museum  of  the  University  of  Michigan,  and  a 
third  in  the  new  Biological  Laboratories  at  the  University 
of  Riclimond.  But  as  I  read  them  over  again  now  these 


In  Retrospect  283 

speeches  do  not  appear  to  have  been  inordinately  creditable 
productions. 

I  look  back  on  my  connection  with  the  development  of 
the  laboratories  in  the  Canal  Zone,  with  the  Soledad  Gar- 
den in  Cuba,  and  with  the  Farm  for  extracting  snake  ven- 
oms at  Tela  in  Honduras  with  great  satisfaction,  for  I  think 
all  of  these  organizations  have  served  a  really  useful  pur- 
pose in  the  world.  Moreover,  in  the  Canal  Zone  I  chanced 
to  meet  the  late  Charles  Cotesworth  Pinckney,  who  became 
a  dear  friend.  Through  him  I  had  the  opportunity  to  love 
and  admire  the  nearest  thing  to  a  saint  that  I  have  ever 
known  in  human  form,  his  brother-in-law,  James  Craik 
Morris,  then  Bishop  of  the  Canal  Zone  and  Parts  Adjacent, 
later  of  Louisiana.  Bishop  Morris  and  his  lovely  wife  have 
played  an  intimate  part  in  my  life,  and  indeed  in  that  of 
all  the  members  of  my  family. 

For  years  I  was  a  hypochondriac  for  a  very  peculiar 
reason.  I  had  so  definitely  in  mind  what  I  wanted  to  ac- 
complish during  my  life  that  I  constantly  suffered  porten- 
tous symptoms  which  I  expected  to  lead  to  death,  just  as 
for  months  after  Bill's  death  I  awaited  what  I  was  sure  was 
impending  insanity.  It  was  not  that  I  was  particularly  afraid 
of  death,  as  such,  but  that  I  dreaded  leaving  work  that  I 
had  planned  to  do  —  a  mess  for  others  to  clean  up. 

Now  all  this  is  changed.  When  but  a  short  time  ago  I 
received  the  notice  of  election  as  Foreign  Honorary  Mem- 
ber of  the  Linnaean  Society  of  London  —  I  had  been  simi- 
larly honored  by  the  Zoological  Societies  of  London  and 
Amsterdam  years  before  —  I  was  elated.  Years  ago  I  too 
had  set  my  cap  for  a  Httle  group  of  hopes:  membership  in 


284  Naturalist  at  Large 

the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society  and  the  American 
Antiquarian  Society,  the  Philosophical  Society  in  Phila- 
delphia, the  American  Academy  of  Arts  and  Sciences  and 
the  National  Academy  of  Sciences  in  Washington,  and,  to 
cap  all,  a  Harvard  honorary  degree.  All  these  have  been 
vouchsafed  unto  me  and  many  other  honors  besides,  not 
the  least  an  honorary  doctorate  from  Dartmouth  and  one 
from  Havana  described  elsewhere.  I  have  many  warm 
friends  in  Hanover.  I  am  not  going  to  write  a  catalogue 
of  the  honors,  or  mention  those  which  came  from  Europe. 
They  all  serve  a  very  great  purpose  for  they  mean  that 
you  can't  quit  trying  to  do  your  best  without  letting  down 
a  lot  of  people.  Moreover,  they  keep  one  humble-minded, 
which  is  good  for  the  soul.  I  wound  up  feeling  that  the 
race  was  run  and  I  might  rest  on  my  oars. 

One  trembles  to  think  of  the  heinous  nature  of  the  orig- 
inal sin  which  gave  rise  to  the  widespread  penance  known  as 
an  annual  report.  Along  with  thousands  of  other  categories 
of  sinners,  the  preparation  of  an  annual  report  is  a  periodical 
duty  for  museum  directors.  I  have  tried  from  time  to  time 
to  make  mine  a  little  bit  more  than  the  literary  dust  which 
is  almost  inevitable.  Sometimes  I  have  succeeded  to  a  sur- 
prising extent,  so  that  my  friends  have  occasionally  written 
and  said  that  they  read  the  report  of  such  and  such  a  year 
with  somewhat  less  loathing  than  usual.  For  the  writing 
of  the  annual  report  is  by  no  means  all  of  the  horror  in- 
volved; a  considerable  nuitiber  of  people  have  to  read  it,  if, 
perchance,  only  because  they  have  to  make  a  digest  of  it 
to  include  in  their  own  annual  tragedy. 

This  year,  in  the  midst  of  a  war-torn  world,  I  have  been 


In  Retrospect  285 

thinking  hard  about  the  whole  question  which  every  el- 
derly person  in  an  administrative  capacity  has  been  pon- 
dering —  as  to  whether  or  not  he  is  pulling  his  weight  in 
the  boat  at  times  like  this.  Or  should  I  shut  the  Museum 
up  and  walk  away  from  it  for  the  duration?  Then  I  read 
something  which  clarified  my  thoughts  and  proved  extraor- 
dinarily comforting.  You  remember  when  Justice  Holmes 
told  of  walking  down  Pennsylvania  Avenue  on  a  drizzly 
night,  after  a  long  session  of  the  Court  which  had  involved 
argumentation,  perplexity,  and  perhaps  some  bickering, 
and  how  raising  his  eyes  and  looking  ahead  he  saw  out  over 
the  Treasury  Department  clear  sky  and  the  shining  of 
stars.  Well,  the  stars  have  shone  for  me  in  the  form  of 
some  lines  recently  written  by  my  friend  Dr.  Albert  Eide 
Parr,  the  distinguished  new  Director  of  the  American  Mu- 
seum of  Natural  History  in  New  York.  Feeling  that  we 
need  a  credo  for  our  work,  he  writes:  — 

This  war  is  not  a  war  for  material  gain,  but  a  war 
for  the  protection  of  a  civilization.  Therefore,  the  spir- 
itual home  front  has  an  importance  in  this  struggle 
which  it  never  had  in  the  imperialistic  battles  of  old. 
And  on  this  spiritual  home  front  the  war  itself  imposes 
a  terrible  handicap  upon  our  efforts.  Democracy  is  a 
type  of  government  designed  for  peace  and  civilized 
living.  We  who  have  had  opportunity  to  mature  in 
a  democracy  at  peace  have  learned  to  love  it  for  the 
beauty  it  reveals  under  the  proper  conditions  for  its 
existence.  Our  love  for  it  is  permanent.  We  can  sus- 
pend its  freedom  for  its  own  protection,  and  hide 
many  of  its  beauties  to  the  world,  safe  in  the  knowl- 


286  Naturalist  at  Large 

edge  that  we  shall  only  long  for  the  day  when  we 
can  set  it  free  again.  But  in  the  meantime,  young 
people  are  growing  up  —  young  people  who  will  spend 
their  formative  years  in  a  democracy  looking  its  worst 
under  conditions  for  which  it  was  not  designed.  The 
educational  system  of  which  we  are  a  part  therefore 
has  the  stupendous  responsibility  to  the  future  of  de- 
mocracy and  of  our  nation,  of  teaching  the  generations 
of  tomorrow  to  love  a  way  of  life  which  by  their  own 
actual  experience  they  will  only  have  opportunity  to 
observe  as  a  tired  and  harassed  image  of  its  former 
beauty  in  times  of  peace,  and  of  the  beauty  it  shall 
regain  anew  after  victory  if  we  do  not  permit  it  to 
become  permanently  marred  by  neglect  in  the  mean- 
time. 

Of  course  our  efforts  would  be  wasted  if  victory 
should  not  be  won.  And  I  know  there  are  people  who 
sincerely  believe  that  for  that  reason  we  ought  to  re- 
duce our  cultural  efforts  to  the  lowest  possible  main- 
tenance level.  In  my  opinion  the  terrible  handicaps 
under  which  we  are  striving  to  implant  in  future 
generations  an  appreciation  of  the  things  for  which 
we  are  fighting  today  call  for  the  entirely  opposite 
attitude.  The  effort  of  our  physical  victory  may  also 
prove  wasted  if  in  the  meantime  we  have  lost  on  the 
spiritual  front.  And  I  do  not  propose  to  apologize 
for  having  sufficient  faith  in  our  ultimate  victory 
to  consider  the  continued  growth  and  development 
of  the  cultural  and  educational  institutions  to 
be  one  of  the  most  essential  duties  which  can  be 
borne  in  our  nation  today,  second  only  to  the  duty 


In  Retrospect  287 

of  those  defending  our  right  to  have  the  civilization 
V7t  want.  At  least  that  is  the  conviction  in  which  I  my- 
self carry  on. 

And  who  but  Robert  E.  Lee  could  ever  have  written 
these  words:  — 

The  march  of  Providence  is  so  slow,  and  our  desires 
so  impatient,  the  work  of  progress  is  so  immense, 
and  our  means  of  aiding  it  so  feeble,  the  life  of  human- 
ity is  so  long,  and  that  of  the  individual  so  brief,  that 
we  often  see  only  the  ebb  of  the  advancing  wave,  and 
are  thus  discouraged.  It  is  history  that  teaches  us  to 
hope. 

I  was  greatly  impressed  as  an  undergraduate  with  a  re- 
mark I  once  heard  Dean  Shaler  make.  Someone  asked  him 
why  he  bothered  to  go  to  chapel  as  regularly  as  he  did. 
The  Dean  replied,  "I  need  a  spiritual  bath  much  more  often 
than  I  need  one  in  the  tub."  This  remark  gave  me  great 
comfort,  inasmuch  as  long  years  ago  I  came  to  the  con- 
clusion that  an  enormous  amount  of  time  was  wasted 
washing  ourselves  when  there  was  absolutely  no  occasion 
or  need  to  do  so.  As  for  the  chapel,  I  must  confess  that 
my  attendance  there  was  not  very  regular. 

With  later  years,  however,  I  have  discovered  that  when 
I  am  low  in  mind  I  derive  great  refreshment  of  spirit  and 
a  real  lift  from  good  ecclesiastical  music.  I  prefer  the  Gre- 
gorian music  and  the  plainsong  of  the  Roman  Church.  I 
started  out  as  a  Presbyterian,  however,  because  my  father 
was  one,  but  long  years  ago  I  lost  interest  in  the  Pres- 
byterian  form   of  worship   and   went  to   the  Episcopal 


288  Naturalist  at  Large 

Church,  which  my  wife  attended,  and  was  finally  confirmed 
therein.  I  have  served  on  the  vestry  of  Trinity  Church 
in  Boston,  and  am  still  Treasurer  of  St.  John's  Church  at 
Beverly  Farms. 

The  intricate  details  of  what  I  believe  or  do  not  believe 
are  seldom  exactly  alike  for  two  days  running,  but  I  com- 
fort myself  constantly  by  recalling  that  I  once  heard  Dean 
Washburn  say  in  the  pulpit  of  Trinity  Church  that  the 
greatest  words  in  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer  were  those 
of  Saint  Augustine  where  he  said,  "Whose  service  is  per- 
fect freedom." 

The  words  come  in  the  Collect  for  Peace:  "O  God, 
who  art  the  author  of  peace  and  lover  of  concord  in  knowl- 
edge of  whom  standeth  our  eternal  life,  whose  service  is 
perfect  freedom."  No  words  of  more  stately  and  majestic 
serenity  appear  in  a  book  which  stylistically  is  unapproach- 
able. The  only  English  which  equals  the  King  James  ver- 
sion of  the  Bible  or  the  Book  of  Common  Prayer  is  John 
Livingston  Lowes's  "Essay  on  Appreciation"  of  that  same 
Bible. 

As  for  the  hymnal,  that  is  a  quite  different  part  of  speech. 
The  number  of  magnificent  tunes  is  vastly  greater  than 
the  number  of  hymns  with  excellent  words.  Of  course, 
there  are  exceptions;  "Once  to  Every  Man  and  Nation," 
by  James  Russell  Lowell,  is  to  me  completely  overwhelm- 
ing. The  same  applies  to  the  hymn,  "Oh  Lord  and  Master 
of  us  all,"  but  this  was  wTitten  by  Whittier.  A^y  other  favor- 
ite, far  and  away  at  the  top  of  the  list  musically,  is  "Let 
all  mortal  flesh  keep  silence,"  the  hymn  which  is  sung  at 
the  communion  service  on  the  great  feast  days  like  Christ- 
mas and  Easter.  The  tune  sung  to  these  words  is  of  utterly 


In  Retrospect  289 

unworldly  beauty  and,  here  again,  is  one  of  the  rare  cases 
when  the  words  are  worthy  of  the  music. 

As  I  say,  the  details  of  one's  personal  religion  are  no- 
body's business  but  one's  own.  However,  I  think  it  is  only 
fair  to  say,  perfectly  frankly,  that  I  have  got  great  com- 
fort out  of  mine,  and  there  have  been  occasions  when,  un- 
supported by  it,  I  should  have  been  hard  put  to  keep  my 
reason. 

My  family  have  never  mixed  themselves  very  much  into 
my  pursuits  at  the  Museum.  My  daughter  Julia  worked 
in  the  Agassiz  Museum  for  a  while  in  the  Department  of 
Birds.  She  and  her  sister  Louisa  are  talented  executives,  ac- 
tive in  the  management  of  social  and  charitable  agencies. 
Besides  this,  Julia  has  a  fine  voice  and  draws  beautifully, 
if  she  would  only  believe  it  and  keep  practising.  Perhaps 
she  will.  My  oldest  daughter,  Mary,  happily  married  to 
Alfred  Kidder  II,  shares  his  archaeological  interest  in  South 
America.  His  calling  brings  him  to  deal  with  objects  fre- 
quently of  rare  beauty,  and  before  her  marriage  Mary  B. 
worked  in  the  Peabody  Museum  for  some  years  as  an  ex- 
pert pottery  restorer.  She  is  also  a  diarist  of  no  mean  talent. 
When  my  old  friend  Ellery  Sedgwick  reviewed  her  last 
book  for  the  Atlajitic  Monthly  with  spontaneous  and  gen- 
erous praise  I  was,  I  think,  even  more  happy  than  she. 

A  catalogue  of  the  friendships  of  any  man  is  bound  to  be 
a  bore,  like  Homer's  Catalogue  of  the  Ships,  but  I  cannot 
refrain  from  mentioning  a  few  of  those  whose  names  may 
not  have  appeared  in  the  pages  which  I  have  written.  I 
think  first  of  Leonhard  Stejneger,  dux,  lex,  lux,  who  began 
answering  my  tiresome  questions  when  I  was  eighteen  and 


290  Naturalist  at  Large 

who  is  doing  so  to  this  day.^  He,  I  think,  take  it  by  and 
large,  is  the  most  erudite  person  I  have  ever  known.  Lat- 
terly my  connection  with  the  Fairchild  Tropical  Garden 
in  Florida  has  been  a  joy.  It  not  only  gave  me  the  oppor- 
tunity to  visit  David  and  Marian  Fairchild  for  long  periods 
of  time,  to  install  the  Palm  Products  Museum  at  the  Gar- 
den, but  to  add  Bob  and  Nell  Montgomery  to  the  list  of 
well  beloved.  Their  superb  collection  of  palms  and  other 
plants  in  southern  Florida  I  have  been  proud  to  add  to  in 
a  little  way  from  time  to  time;  a  trifling  recompense  for 
the  hospitality  they  have  offered  me. 

To  this  record  I  want  to  add  the  importance  to  me  and 
to  the  Museum  of  the  wise  council  and  generous  assistance 
of  my  colleagues  George  Agassiz  and  George  Shattuck, 
members  of  the  Museum's  Governing  Board.  And  let  me 
add  this  observation  here  right  now  and  say  that  it  is  dif- 
ficult for  me  to  describe  the  sensations  almost  of  triumph 
which  I  have  felt  when  each  one  of  George  Nelson's  su- 
perbly mounted  fossils  has  been  added  to  what  formerly 
was  one  of  the  most  insignificant  collections  in  the 
Museum. 

Two  keys  I  have  had  which  have  opened  the  doors  to 
more  happiness  than  most  of  those  on  my  bulky  key  ring. 
One  opened  the  doors  of  800  i6th  Street  in  Washington, 
where  Mrs.  Hay  and  later  Jim  and  Alice  Wadsworth  made 
many  trips  to  the  Capital,  which  would  have  otherwise 
been  dreary  chores,  pure  delights,  the  memories  of  which 
still  remain  fresh  and  clear.  The  same  may  be  said  of  the 
key  to  1720  I  Street,  where  my  wife's  cousins,  Wendell  and 

^He  died  after  these  lines  were  written  February  28,  1943. 


T.  B.'s  office  in  the  Agassiz  Museum 

The  author's  library  to  the  right;  Agassiz  fireplace  to  the  left; 

the  "^Eateria"  above 


In  Retrospect  291 

Fanny  Holmes,  made  each  visit  an  intellectual  adventure, 
and  during  the  war  years  I  came  up  from  Havana  to  Wash- 
ington on  numberless  occasions.  They  fixed  me  a  room 
on  the  top  story  of  the  house,  bound  two  single  beds  to- 
gether with  metal  bands,  and  thus  provided  rest  for  my 
elongate  figure.  Once  when  the  Tavern  Club  in  Boston 
was  going  to  give  a  dinner  to  Stephen  Vincent  Benet, 
which  I  greatly  regret  having  missed,  Owen  Wister,  then 
its  president,  wired  the  Justice  for  a  message.  I  happened 
to  be  at  hand  when  the  telegram  arrived  and  I  seized  it  and 
the  draft  of  the  reply.  These  I  now  have  framed  together. 
Cousin  Wendell  wrote,  "The  first  book  I  read  about  law 
was  Benet  on  Court  Practice.  The  last  word  I  read  about 
war  was  Benet's  John  Bronmfs  Body.  The  name  has  been  a 
Benediction  to  me  and  I  salute  the  bearer  of  it." 

Mr.  Lowell's  appointment  of  me,  Henry  Bigelow,  and 
several  other  colleagues  to  professorships  in  the  Faculty  of 
Arts  and  Sciences  closed  the  breach  which  had  previously 
existed  between  those  servants  of  the  University  engaged 
in  taxonomic  research  and  those  interested  in  other  branches 
of  biology.  At  times,  largely  because  the  biological  labora- 
tories were  housed  in  the  Museum  building  and  all  hands 
were  frightfully  overcrowded,  the  feeling  had  been  bitter 
indeed. 

Election  as  Trustee  of  the  Carnegie  Institution  in  Wash- 
ington, the  Woods  Hole  Oceanographic  Institution,  Boston 
Museum  of  Natural  History,  of  which  I  have  been  presi- 
dent for  years,  the  Peabody  Museum  of  Salem,  the  Bishop 
Rhinelander  Foundation,  and  above  all  to  the  Latin  Amer- 
ican Committee  to  choose  Fellows  under  the  John  Simon 
Guggenheim  Memorial  Foundation  —  all  these  have  brought 


292  Naturalist  at  Large 

me  the  opportunity  for  acquaintanceship  with  a  number 
of  distinguished  men,  many  of  whom  have  long  been  warm 
friends. 

When  I  became  Director  of  the  Agassiz  Museum,  it  was 
obvious  that  I  should  be  unable  to  take  care  of  my  old 
pets,  reptiles  and  amphibians.  I  was  able  to  bring  Mr.  Ar- 
thur Loveridge  from  the  Nairobi  Museum,  and  I  have  al- 
ways been  glad  I  did  so.  His  collections  are  better  indexed 
and  arranged  than  any  other  collection  of  reptiles  in  the 
world.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  there  is  only  one  more  com- 
plete collection  —  the  one  in  London.  The  collection  of 
reptiles  and  amphibians  now  contains  typical  material  of 
about  2300  species  and  there  are  something  over  100,000 
specimens  representing  the  two  groups. 

The  collection  of  birds  has  grown  enormously.  There  are 
now  about  300,000  specimens,  and  while  this  is  not  a  large 
collection  in  comparison  with  the  collections  in  London, 
New  York,  or  Washington,  it  is  singularly  well-chosen 
and  reflects  a  great  deal  of  credit  upon  the  curatorial 
capacity  of  its  caretaker,  James  Lee  Peters,  who  as  a  curator 
is  a  worthy  successor  to  Outram  Bangs. 

I  don't  know  why,  but  our  collection  of  mammals  has 
never  grown  the  way  the  collection  of  birds  has  done.  It 
amounts  to  about  60,000  skins.  Nevertheless,  it  is  a  fine 
collection  and  a  useful  one  as  shown  by  the  constant  ap- 
plications to  borrow  specimens  for  study  elsewhere.  It  is 
now  in  the  competent  hands  of  Barbara  Lawrence,  whose 
husband,  WilHam  Schevill,  is  our  learned  librarian. 

Our  enormous  collection  of  fish  is  at  last  getting  organ- 
ized. It  is  hard  to  estimate  how  many  specimens  we  really 
have,  for  it  has  been  the  custom  in  this  department  to 


In  Retrospect  293 

catalogue  lots  and  not  individual  specimens.  There  are 
something  in  the  vicinity  of  40,000  glass  jars,  187  copper 
tanks  for  larger  specimens,  and  five  of  what  we  call  coffins, 
metal-lined  receptacles  about  nine  feet  long,  four  feet  wide, 
and  three  feet  deep,  which  contain  sharks  and  similar  mon- 
sters. Many  of  the  jars  contain  from  50  to  100  speci- 
mens, sometimes  even  more,  so  that  your  guess  is  as 
good  as  mine  as  to  how  many  fish  there  actually  are  in  the 
Museum. 

During  the  last  twenty  years  we  have  acquired  by  gift 
some  enormous  collections  of  insects  —  the  collection  of 
beetles  made  by  my  wife's  uncle,  Frederick  Channing 
Bowditch,  the  Weeks  collection  of  butterflies,  the  Wheeler 
collection  of  ants,  the  Harris  collection,  and  many,  many 
others.  Consideringr  the  enormous  accretions  to  a  collection 
of  insects  which  was  already  very  large,  the  material  is 
all  in  fine  shape,  largely  owing  to  the  unbelievable  industry 
and  wide  learning  of  Professor  Nathan  Banks. 

The  collection  of  mollusks  has  grown  to  be  one  of  the 
very  largest  in  the  world  and  William  Clench  keeps  it  in 
perfect  order.  It  is  a  joy  to  behold.  The  objects  themselves 
are  inherently  so  beautiful  that  in  the  mass  they  are  be- 
wildering. A  tremendous  windfall  came  in  the  other  day 
when  Amherst  College  decided  to  entrust  the  care  of  the 
Adams  collection  to  this  Museum.  Clench  estimates  that  in 
the  aggregate  there  are  140,071  lots  of  shells  in  the  depart- 
ment, representing  about  28,000  species,  and  the  total 
number  may  be  6,000,000  and  the  types  5000  to  6000. 

Frank  Carpenter  has  built  up  the  collection  of  fossil 
insects  largely  with  his  own  hands,  for  he  is  as  skilled  in 
the  field  as  in  the  laboratory.  His  collection  is  now  the 


294  Naturalist  at  Large 

best  in  the  world  and  he  has  1376  types  and  something  in 
the  vicinity  of  60,000  specimens. 

Thanks  to  Mr.  Agassiz,  our  collection  of  echinoderms  is 
excellent.  This  is  the  department  in  which  he  himself  was 
most  interested.  Years  ago  he  invited  Dr.  Hubert  Lyman 
Clark  to  come  here  to  be  his  associate  and  study  these 
groups  and  he  still  continues  to  have  general  charge.  There 
are  of  sea  urchins  554  species,  represented  by  145  types. 
This  is  the  largest  proportion  in  relation  to  the  total  number 
of  species  in  the  world  of  any  collection  in  the  whole 
Museum.  Brittle  stars,  represented  by  11 14  species,  442 
types;  starfish,  759  species,  150  types;  and  the  sea  cucum- 
bers, represented  by  484  species  and  120  types,  form  a 
good  proportion  of  the  species  described,  but  our  collec- 
tion of  sea  lilies,  or  crinoids,  is  not  to  be  compared  with 
the  one  which  Austin  Clark  has  built  up  in  Washington. 
But  of  these  groups  there  are  in  all  104,000  specimens  and 
7000  types,  which  is  a  good  showing. 

The  Museum  by  tradition  has  always  been  interested  in 
fossil  fishes  and  we  have  a  splendid  collection  of  about 
44,880  specimens  contained  in  no  less  than  1122  trays.  I 
am  not  as  familiar  with  this  material  as  I  should  be,  although 
I  once  worked  for  some  time  on  the  material  from  Mount 
Lebanon  and  found  that  we  had  a  large  proportion  of  the 
species  which  have  been  discovered  there.  Our  recent 
accessions  have  been  from  Cuba  and  our  oldest  material  is, 
of  course,  the  European  collections  which  were  brought 
to  this  country  by  Louis  Agassiz.  This  we  are  fortunate  to 
possess  for,  generally  speaking,  American  museums  are 
weak  in  European  material  and  for  comparative  purposes 
these  collections  are  very  important.  Henry  Stetson  gave 


In  Retrospect  29  S 

up  a  brilliant  career  studying  the  ancestral  fishes  to  enter 
another  field,  in  which  he  has  also  distinguished  himself 
handsomely:  the  study  of  cores  brought  up  by  mechani- 
cally driven  tubes  which,  forced  into  the  sea  bottom,  provide 
a  picture  of  the  results  of  submarine  sedimentation  and 
hence  of  geologic  history  —  details  which  a  few  years  ago 
no  one  ever  dreamt  of. 

In  vertebrate  paleontology  we  got  off  to  a  bad  start,  but 
now  that  Professor  Alfred  Romer  has  come  from  Chicago 
to  take  charge  of  these  fossils,  the  collection  has  at  last 
begun  to  grow.  Professor  Raymond  has  for  many  years  had 
charge  of  the  invertebrates,  which  is  a  gigantic  collection, 
numbering  close  to  a  million  specimens  and  contained  in 
no  less  than  5549  trays.  Our  early  primitive  reptiles  of 
North  and  South  America  are  good  and  our  mammal  col- 
lection is  growing  fast. 

The  collection  of  Crustacea  is  growing  well  in  Fenner 
Chace's  hands.  He  estimates  that  he  has  1 500  type  specimens 
and  probably  200,000  specimens  in  all.  I  can  only  make  a 
short  statement  concerning  the  other  marine  invertebrate 
groups  —  corals,  jellyfishes,  sponges,  worms,  and  so  on. 
There  are  probably  about  800  types  and  3380  lots  of 
specimens  in  these  categories  which  are  not  well  repre- 
sented in  most  museums.  They  frequently  tend  to  accentu- 
ate the  interest  in  conspicuous  or  spectacular  material.  We, 
on  the  other  hand,  have  made  a  sincere  attempt,  at  least,  to 
build  up  a  collection  which  is  thoroughly  well  rounded. 

This  all  sounds  as  if  I  were  a  hideous  boaster,  but  I  think 
for  the  sake  of  the  historical  record  it  is  worth  while  taking 
note  of  the  material  which  this  Museum  contains  at  the  date 
on  which  I  am  writing. 


APPENDICES 


I.    For  Zoographers  Only 

Wallace  stated,  many  years  ago,  that  there  are  two  dif- 
ferent types  of  islands.  Those  which  he  calls  oceanic  islands 
have  never  by  any  likelihood  been  connected  with  other 
land.  A  good  example  is  St.  Helena.  There  are  others  where 
changes  in  the  earth's  crust  have  broken  up  large  land 
masses  into  what  are  now  islands.  There  has  always  been 
a  lot  of  discussion  among  naturalists  as  to  details,  particu- 
larly in  the  East  and  West  Indies. 

It  is  clear  that  some  separations  can  be  explained  by  the 
fact  that  the  oceans  stand  at  a  higher  level  now  than  they 
did  when  a  large  part  of  the  water  on  the  earth's  surface 
was  tied  up  in  the  form  of  ice  during  the  several  periods  of 
maximum  glaciation  —  when  the  polar  icecap  was  enor- 
mously thick.  I  have  argued  principally  concerning  the 
West  Indies,  where  many  connections  could  be  explained 
by  this  tie-up-of-ice  theory,  and  I  also  believe  that  many 
of  the  deep  passageways  can  be  explained  by  what  geol- 
ogists call  downthrust-faulting,  where  an  area  drops  rap- 
idly, geologically  speaking  of  course,  and  makes  a  deep 
strait,  sometimes  counterbalanced  by  an  upthrust  some- 
where else.  I  believe,  for  instance,  that  the  mountain 
known  as  the  Morro  of  Monte  Criste  on  the  northern  coast 
of  Hispaniola  and  the  Yunque  of  Baracoa  on  the  northeast 
coast  of  Cuba  represent  upthrust-fault  blocks,  while  the 
separation  between  Jamaica  and  Haiti  represents  a  com- 
paratively recent  downthrust  area.  The  surface  of  the 
earth  is  in  somewhat  unstable  equilibrium,  what  geologists 
call  isostatic  balance. 


300  Naturalist  at  Large 

At  the  risk  of  being  dry  and  prosy  I  am  giving  here 
some  arguments  which  I  have  used  concerning  the  distri- 
bution of  the  animal  Hfe  in  the  West  Indies.  This  is  matter 
of  great  theoretical  interest  with  no  practical  appUcation 
of  any  sort  whatsoever. 

A  peculiarity  of  the  fauna  of  Jamaica  is  the  fact  that 
while  its  proximity  to  Cuba  is  practically  the  same  as  its 
distance  from  Haiti,  the  evident  relationship  of  the  island's 
fauna  with  that  of  Haiti  is  well  marked,  while  with  Cuba 
it  has  only  in  common  species  which  range  widely  through 
the  West  Indian  region.  Now  a  possible  explanation  of  this 
offers  itself  when  we  examine  a  contour  map  of  the  Carib- 
bean Sea.  One  of  these  was  published  as  Figure  57  in  Mr. 
Alexander  Agassiz's  Three  Cruises  of  the  Blake  (Bulletin 
of  the  Museimt  of  Coifiparative  Xoology,  1888,  14).  Mr. 
Agassiz  showed  here  that  the  Bartlett  Deep,  of  over  3000 
fathoms,  extends  between  Cuba  and  Jamaica  —  doubtless 
a  cleft  of  very  ancient  origin.  But  the  depth  of  water 
between  the  great  southern  arm  of  Haiti  and  Jamaica  is 
only  from  500  to  800  fathoms.  There  is,  it  is  true,  a  hole  of 
a  depth  greater  than  this  south  of  the  Formigas  Bank.  This, 
however,  is  very  Hmited  in  area,  and  does  not  fundamen- 
tally affect  the  condition  of  affairs.  The  water  between 
Jamaica  and  the  Mosquito  Coast  of  Central  America  is, 
much  of  it,  extremely  shallow,  mostly  100  fathoms  or  less; 
though  between  the  Pedro  Bank  and  the  RosaHnd  Bank 
there  is  a  narrow  stretch  of  water  of  about  500  fathoms 
depth. 

Hydrographically,  then,  Jamaica  is  intimately  related 
with  both  Central  America  and  Haiti,  and  it  seems  probable 


For  Zoographers  Only  301 

that  Lesser  Antillean  species  and  Central  American  species 
have  come  through  a  land  connection  which  had  nothing  to 
do  with  Cuba.  This  would  account,  for  instance,  for  the 
presence  of  the  Hzard  Aristelliger  in  Haiti  and  Jamaica. 
The  early  separation  of  Jamaica  from  the  mainland  and 
from  Haiti  would  account  for  the  absence  of  types  having 
such  a  distribution  as  Bufo,  the  common  toads,  and  Am- 
phisbaena,  the  blind  lizards  —  which  may  easily  have 
reached  Haiti  from  the  mainland  of  Central  America  by 
way  of  Cuba.  Another  connection  must  have  existed  be- 
tween Cuba  and  the  upper  peninsula  of  Haiti  after  the 
separation  of  Jamaica  from  Haiti,  and  may  we  not  suppose 
that  the  separation  took  place  before  the  migration  of  Bufo 
or  Amphisbaena  had  extended  far  enough  to  have  reached 
Jamaica? 

The  question  is  undoubtedly  far  more  complex  than  the 
suggestions  contained  in  the  previous  paragraphs  would 
indicate.  Wallace  in  his  Geographical  Distribution  of 
Ani?nals  (London,  1876,  2,  p.  81)  says:  — 

The  West  Indian  Islands  have  been  long  isolated 
and  have  varied  much  in  extent.  Originally,  they 
probably  formed  part  of  Central  America,  and  may 
have  been  united  with  Yucatan  and  Honduras  in  one 
extensive  tropical  land.  But  their  separation  from  the 
continent  took  place  at  a  remote  period,  and  they  have 
since  broken  up  into  numerous  islands,  which  have 
probably  undergone  much  submergence  in  recent 
times.  This  has  led  to  that  poverty  of  the  higher  forms 
of  life,   combined   with   the   remarkable   speciality, 


302  Naturalist  at  Large 

which  now  characterizes  them;  while  their  fauna  still 
preserves  a  sufficient  resemblance  to  that  of  Central 
America  to  indicate  its  origin. 

Masterly  as  is  the  above  resume  of  the  status  of  conditions 
in  the  region  under  discussion,  we  suspect  that  Dr.  Wallace 
would  have  written  somewhat  differently  had  he  penned 
these  lines  fifty  years  later. 

Another  view  resting  solely  on  geological  or  physio- 
graphical  evidence  is  that  presented  by  Dr.  R.  T.  Hill,  who 
conducted  investigations  on  the  geographic  relations  of 
the  West  Indies  under  the  auspices  of  Mr.  Agassiz.  In  an 
article  published  in  the  Natiofial  Geographic  Magazine 
(May  1896,  7,  p.  181)  he  concludes  with  these  words:  — 

The  Greater  Antilles  lie  along  the  line  of  east-west 
corrugations  and  apparently  represent  nodes  of  greater 
elevation  whereby  the  surfaces  of  these  islands  were 
projected  above  the  waters  as  islands,  which  have 
persisted  without  continental  connection  or  union 
with  each  other  since  their  origin. 

If  we  accept  Mr.  Hill's  conclusion,  which  I  for  one  cer- 
tainly do  not,  it  is  impossible  to  account  for  a  West  Indian 
flora  and  fauna  except  by  riding  to  death  the  old  theory 
of  "flotsam  and  jetsam."  Ocean  currents  and  prevailing 
winds  could  hardly  have  carried  Central  American  types 
to  any  of  the  islands,  as  they  work  strongly  in  an  opposing 
direction.  This  fact  alone  serves  to  prove  the  utter  im- 
possibility of  Hill's  conclusion.  Even  were  winds  and  cur- 
rents favoring,  we  know  now  that  the  number  of  types 
which  will  withstand  a  long  submersion  in  sea  water  is 


For  Zoographers  Only  303 

vastly  smaller  tlian  was  once  supposed  when  it  was  thought 
that  reptiles,  amphibians,  land  mollusks,  and  in  fact  almost 
all  orders  of  animals  were  carried  hither  and  thither 
throughout  the  oceanic  areas. 

Mr.  Agassiz  has  expressed  an  opinion  on  this  series  of 
relationships  in  his  chapters  in  The  Three  Cruises  of  the 
Blake  entitled  "American  and  West  Indian  Fauna  and  Flora" 
and  "Permanence  of  Continents  and  Oceanic  Basins."  The 
following  (loc.  cit.y  14,  p.  m)  is  pertinent:  — 

At  the  western  end  of  t':e  Caribbean  Sea  the 
hundred-fathom  line  forms  a  gigantic  bank  off  the 
Mosquito  coast,  extending  over  one  third  the  distance 
from  the  mainland  to  the  island  of  Jamaica.  The 
Rosalind,  Pedro,  and  a  few  other  smaller  banks,  limited 
by  the  same  line,  denote  the  position  of  more  or  less 
important  islands  which  may  have  once  existed  be- 
tween the  Mosquito  coast  and  Jamaica.  On  examining 
the  five-hundred-fathom  line,  we  thus  find  that  Ja- 
maica is  only  the  northern  spit  of  a  gigantic  promon- 
tory, which  perhaps  once  stretched  toward  Hayti  from 
the  mainland,  reaching  from  Costa  Rica  to  the  north- 
ern part  of  the  Mosquito  coast.  There  is  left  but  a 
comparatively  narrow  passage  between  this  promon- 
tory and  the  five-hundred-fathom  line  which  encircles 
Hayti,  Porto  Rico,  and  the  Virgin  Islands  in  one 
gigantic  island. 

The  passage  between  Cuba  and  Jamaica  has  a  depth 
of  over  three  thousand  fathoms,  and  that  between  Hayti 
and  Cuba  is  not  less  than  eight  hundred  and  seventy- 
three  fathoms  in  depth. 


304  Naturalist  at  Large 

Referring   to    the    same    subject,    Mr.    Agassiz   writes 
(pp.  112-113):  - 

At  the  time  of  this  connection,  if  it  existed,  the 
Caribbean  Sea  was  connected  with  the  Atlantic  only 
by  a  narrow  passage  of  a  few  miles  in  width  between 
St.  Lucia  and  Martinique,  by  one  somewhat  wider  and 
slightly  deeper  between  Martinique  and  Dominica, 
by  another  between  Sombrero  and  the  Virgin  Islands, 
and  by  a  comparatively  narrow  passage  between 
Jamaica  and  Hayti.  The  hundred-fathom  line  con- 
nects the  Bahamas  with  the  northeastern  end  of  Cuba; 
the  five-hundred  fathom  line  unites  them  not  only 
with  Cuba,  but  also  with  Florida.  The  Caribbean  Sea, 
therefore,  must  have  been  a  gulf  of  the  Pacific,  or 
have  been  connected  with  it  by  wide  passages,  of 
which  we  find  the  traces  in  the  tertiary  and  cretaceous 
deposits  of  the  Isthmus  of  Darien,  of  Panama,  and  of 
Nicaragua.  Central  America  and  northern  South 
America  at  that  time  must  have  been  a  series  of  large 
islands,  with  passages  leading  between  them  from  the 
Pacific  into  the  Caribbean. 

And  on  page  113:  — 

While  undoubtedly  soundings  indicate  clearly  the 
nature  of  the  submarine  topography,  it  by  no  means 
follows  that  this  ancient  land  connection  did  exist  as 
has  been  sketched  above.  At  the  time  when  the  larger 
West  India  Islands  were  formed  and  elevated  above 
the  level  of  the  sea,  they  may  have  been  raised  as  one 
gigantic  submarine  plateau  of  irregular  shape,  in  which 


For  Zoographers  Only  305 

were    included    the    Bahamas,    Florida,    Cuba,    San 
Domingo,  Porto  Rico,  and  the  Virgin  Islands. 

If  we  grant  for  the  sake  of  argument  that  the  Greater 
Antilles,  like  all  Oceanic  Islands,  have  received  their  fauna 
fortuitously,  we  must  then  explain  the  regularity  and  con- 
sistency with  which  the  fauna  has  spread  from  two  direc- 
tions to  populate  such  a  great  number  of  separate  islands, 
with  and  against  the  prevaihng  wind  and  current.  We  find 
in  the  Lesser  Antilles  that  the  fauna  is  of  almost  purely 
northwest  South  American  origin;  as  we  pass  thence  to 
St.  Thomas  and  to  Porto  Rico  we  note,  as  Stejneger  has 
shown,  the  very  evident  twofold  origin  already  mentioned. 
Then  in  Jamaica  and  Cuba  the  balance  is  in  the  opposite 
direction  —  types  of  Central  American  origin  predomi- 
nate. 

The  ancestry  of  Cricosaura,  Amphisbaena,  Bufo,  and 
many  other  forms  recently  discovered  prove  that  migra- 
tion to  these  two  islands  took  place  along  independent 
land  bridges.  The  Jamaican  coney  belongs  to  a  different 
section  of  the  genus  (Capromys),  similar  to  the  Haitian 
and  different  from  the  Cuban  species,  and  Solenodon  occurs 
in  Cuba  and  Haiti  and  not  now  —  nor,  so  far  as  we  know, 
did  it  ever  —  in  Jamaica;  these  facts  prove  or  help  to  prove 
the  independent  connection  with  Haiti  of  both  Cuba  and 
Jamaica.  Finally,  in  favor  of  the  "bridge  theory"  Dr.  Stej- 
neger in  a  recent  letter  writes:  "Whatever  the  mountain 
structure  may  show,  certainly  the  geographical  distribu- 
tion of  the  animals  shows  that  the  Greater  Antilles  have 
been  part  of  a  continent  at  some  time." 

That  Dr.  Stejneger's  opinion  represents  views  which  are 


306  Naturalist  at  Large 

gaining  constantly  in  credence  among  present-day  students 
of  zoogeography  there  can  be  no  doubt.  Dr.  R.  F.  ScharfT 
in  his  History  of  the  European  Faima  (London,  1 899)  cites 
many  experiments  to  show  that  land  snails  are  more  easily 
killed  by  immersion  in  salt  water  than  many  students  in 
the  past  have  supposed.  Slugs  in  the  act  of  crawling  on  twigs 
drop  off  immediately  when  subjected  to  a  slight  spray  of 
sea  water.  Scharff  {loc.  cit.,  p.  17)  continues:  "If  we  sup- 
posed, therefore,  that  a  slug  had  successfully  reached  the 
sea,  transported  on  a  tree-trunk,  the  moisture  would  tend 
to  lure  it  forth  from  its  hiding-place  under  the  bark, 
whilst  the  mere  spray  would  prove  fatal  to  its  existence." 
He  adds  that  species  of  snails  and  slugs  which  lead  an  under- 
ground existence  would  be  much  less  likely  to  get  started 
on  these  sea  voyages.  The  suggestion  advanced  by  Darwin 
that  young  snails  just  hatched  might  adhere  to  the  feet 
of  birds  roosting  on  the  ground  and  then  be  transported 
seems  improbable.  Dr.  ScharfT  in  his  European  Animals: 
Their  Geological  History  and  Geographical  Distribution 
(New  York,  1907)  states  that  Dr.  Knud  Andersen  of 
Copenhagen  has  informed  him  in  a  letter  that  he  has  ex- 
amined the  legs  and  wings  of  many  thousands  of  migratory 
birds,  "that  their  legs  were  clean;  and  no  seeds  or  other 
objects  were  found  adhering  to  their  feathers,  beaks  or 
feet.  It  has  also  been  proved  that  birds  migrate  on  empty 
stomachs." 

There  is  also  good  authority  for  the  statement  that 
amphibians  and  earthworms  very  rarely  or  never  occur  on 
the  two  shores  of  a  stretch  of  sea  unless  there  is  evidence 
showing  the  former  existence  of  a  land  connection. 

To  quote  again  from  Scharff  (loc.  cit.,  pp.  18-20):  — 


For  Zoographers  Only  307 

The  formerly  prevalent  belief  of  the  permanence 
of  ocean  basins  has  been  shaken  by  the  utterances  of 
some  of  the  greatest  geologists  of  our  day,  while  many 
positively  assert  that  what  is  now  deep  sea  of  more 
than  I  GOG  fathoms  was  dry  land  within  comparatively 
recent  geological  epochs. 

He  continues  (p.  21):  — 

Amphibians  are  affected  in  the  same  manner  by 
sea-water  as  slugs  are.  The  accidental  transportal  of 
an  amphibian  from  the  mainland  to  an  island  is  there- 
fore almost  inconceivable.  The  presence  of  frogs, 
toads,  and  newts  in  the  British  Islands,  in  Corsica  and 
Sardinia,  indicates,  if  nothing  else  did,  that  all  these 
islands  were  at  no  distant  date  united  with  the  con- 
tinent of  Europe. 

These  quotations  show  that  the  belief  held  by  the  writer 
is  not  an  unusual  one,  for  certainly  the  fauna  of  the  Greater 
Antilles  is  vastly  richer  in  species  than  on  the  islands  just 
mentioned. 

For  the  person  who  may  be  interested  to  continue  read- 
ing on  this  general  subject  I  can  recommend  Dr.  Schuchert's 
Historical  Geology  of  the  Antillean-Caribbean  Region.  This 
appeared  in  1935  and  not  only  is  fascinating  reading  but 
contains  a  series  of  maps  showing  the  distribution  of  the 
land  areas  in  past  geologic  times  which  lend  great  support 
to  the  thesis  which  I  have  been  defending  for  so  many 
years. 

Now  a  word  further  regarding  isostasy.  There  is  hardly 
a  principle  in  geology  concerning  which  there  is  greater 


308  Naturalist  at  Large 

uncertainty  among  geologists  than  the  matter  of  isostatic 
balance.  Only  one  thing  is  sure,  isostasy  must  meet  and 
conform  to  known  or  presumably  known  facts,  and  the 
fact  that  fundamental  changes  have  taken  place  in  the 
form  of  the  earth's  surface  in  recent  geologic  time  is  not 
to  be  denied.  Such  features  as  the  Great  Rift  Valley  of 
Africa  and  its  continuation,  the  Red  Sea  and  the  Dead  Sea, 
the  Black  Sea,  the  Basin  of  the  Mediterranean,  are  held  now 
by  geologists  to  be  the  results  of  nothing  but  gigantic  and 
fairly  recent  down-thrown  fault-blocks.  For  other  examples 
of  changes  of  land  and  sea  level  with  relation  to  each  other, 
the  Valley  of  the  Po  and  the  Central  Valley  of  CaHfornia 
are  good  evidence.  The  argument  of  isostatic  balance  may 
probably  be  held  to  control  the  conditions  in  the  Pacific 
Basin  as  a  whole,  but  isostasy  cannot  be  used  effectively  as 
an  argument  in  a  relatively  small  area  anywhere.  Professor 
R.  A.  Daly  tells  me  that  there  is  clear  evidence  of  the 
fragmentation  of  a  great  land  mass,  including  the  Fiji 
Islands  and  New  Caledonia,  but  that  there  is  no  evidence 
known  at  present  of  such  a  condition  outside  of  a  line 
joining  Yap,  in  the  Caroline  Islands,  with  the  Fijis, 
Kermadecs,  and  New  Zealand.  In  addition,  radiolarian  ooze, 
supposedly  only  to  be  derived  from  the  deep  sea,  has  long 
been  known  from  Barbados,  Trinidad,  Aruba,  Buen  Ayre, 
and  Curacaos,  but  the  origin  of  this  series  of  deposits  has 
been  somewhat  in  dispute.  Two  recent  papers  by  Dr.  G.  A. 
F.  Molengraff,  however,  describe  deposits  of  which  there 
can  hardly  be  any  question  whatever;  one  is  "On  Oceanic 
Deep  Sea  Deposits  in  Central  Borneo,"  ^  while  the  other  is 

^  Kon.  Ak.  Wet.  Amsterdam,  Reprint  from  proceedings  of 
meeting  June  26,  1909:  141- 147.  (Reprint:   1-7.) 


For  Zoographers  Only  309 

entitled  ''Over  mangaan  Knollen  in  mesozoischen  diepzeeaf- 
•zettmgen  van  Borneo,  Timor  en  Rotti,  him  beteekenis  en 
hun  imjzer  van  Opstaan.'''  ^  These  papers  show  that  on  the 
islands  of  Borneo,  Timor,  and  Rotti,  at  an  elevation  of 
about  4000  feet,  very  extensive  deposits  occur  which  a 
microscopical  examination  shows  to  be  composed  of  radio- 
laria,  together  with  the  manganese  nodules  so  characteristic 
of  the  deep  sea.  In  other  words,  Molengraff  has  found  an 
extensive  area  of  deep  sea  floor  raised  to  4000  feet  above 
the  present  sea  level.  On  the  southeast  coast  of  Africa, 
W.  M.  Davis  noticed  the  truncation  by  the  present  shore 
line  of  extensive  concentric  terraces,  traceable  far  inland, 
which  could  only  mean  the  down-faulting  of  a  gigantic 
block  of  material  to  bring  the  shore  line  into  its  present 
state.  It  will  be  said  at  once  that  some  of  these  changes  of 
level  have  taken  place  in  zones  known  to  be  incomplete  in 
isostatic  adjustment,  but  this  is  a  matter  of  no  moment 
whatsoever  in  comparison  with  the  fact  that  change  of 
level  may  be  found  to  have  occurred  in  the  very  areas 
where  the  islands  under  discussion  are  found.  Celebes  does 
not  lie  upon  the  continental  shelf,  and  yet  the  island  has 
an  obviously  continental  fauna,  and  the  late  Mr.  WilHam 
D.  Matthew,  my  principal  and  very  friendly  adversary  in 
these  arguments,  has  told  me  himself  that  Celebes  has  been 
a  source  of  no  small  worry  to  him.  Cuba  has  similarly  a 
large  fauna  derived  from  the  American  continent,  although 
it  does  not  lie  upon  the  continental  shelf.  Vaughan,  a 
thoroughly  conservative  observer,  beheves  {in  litteris)  that 
Cuba  was  quite  possibly  separated,  by  the  down-faulting 

*  Kon.  Ak.  Wet.  Amsterdam  23: 1058-1073.  (Reprint:  1-16.) 


310  Naturalist  at  Large 

of  blocks  of  material,  from  both  Haiti  and  the  mainland. 
Dr.  Matthew  was  the  most  scholarly  student  of  fossil 
mammals  which  America  has  produced.  He  was  for  many 
years  at  the  American  Museum  of  Natural  History  in  New 
York  and  then,  preferring  a  more  tranquil  life,  went  to 
the  University  of  Cahfornia,  where  he  died  some  years  ago. 
We  carried  on  a  sort  of  symposium  in  print  on  this  matter 
of  distribution  for  some  years.  It  was  a  pleasure  to  differ 
from  Matthew  because  he  was  so  perfectly  courteous  and 
invariably  impersonal.  In  1939  the  New  York  Academy 
of  Sciences  brought  out  a  special  publication,  with  an  ex- 
cellent portrait  of  my  old  friend,  a  reprinting  of  his  Climate 
and  Evolution  and  my  remarks  {Special  Publications  of 
the  NeiD  York  Academy  of  Sciences,  Vol.  I,  pp.  i-xii, 
1-223).  The  upshot  of  all  this  is  that  we  shall  probably 
know  a  great  deal  more  about  this  subject  in  the  years  to 
come,  as  the  paleontological  evidence  is  piling  up.  Even 
now  we  know  more  about  the  fossil  animals  of  Cuba, 
Jamaica,  and  Puerto  Rico  than  we  did  a  generation  ago  — 
very  much  more  —  and  not  improbably  more  evidence  will 
be  forthcoming  in  the  future.  Once  I  thought  this  was  a 
"pay  your  money  and  take  your  choice"  problem,  because 
there  is  good  argumentation  both  ways,  but  I  feel  now 
that  Matthew  would  have  felt  quite  differently  had  he 
lived  to  read  Schuchert's  book,  published  in  1935. 


IL    Render  unto  Caesar 

Over  the  course  of  years  the  director  of  a  museum  has 
the  opportunity  of  working  with  many  associates  and 
young  assistants,  and  it  is  to  these  oncoming  naturahsts  and 
curators  that  I  wish  to  devote  my  last  few  pages.  This 
record  would  not  be  complete  without  a  word  of  recogni- 
tion of  the  constant  and  faithful  assistance  which  I  have 
received  from  four  secretaries  —  Beatrice  Johnson,  Frances 
M.  Wilder,  Elizabeth  Grundy,  and,  above  all,  Helene  M. 
Robinson. 

Added  to  this  is  the  fact  that  some  of  my  graduate  stu- 
dents have,  to  my  great  satisfaction,  turned  out  to  be  dis- 
tinguished scholars  and  remain  warm  friends  to  this  day. 
I  think  at  once  of  Emmett  Reid  Dunn,  Wilham  M.  Mann, 
John  Wendell  Bailey,  Afranio  do  Amaral,  and  Alexander 
Graham  Bell  Fairchild  and  Marston  Bates,  son  and  son-in- 
law  of  my  old  friend  David  Fairchild.  Others  who  have 
contributed  greatly  to  my  happiness  on  numberless  oc- 
casions have  been  Margaret  Porter  Bigelow,  to  whom,  with 
Archie  and  Margie  Carr  of  the  University  of  Florida,  I 
presume  to  feel  in  loco  parentis;  the  Harold  Loomises  of 
Coconut  Grove  and  their  children  Margie  and  Jim;  Dick 
and  Helen  Gaige  at  Ann  Arbor;  Elisabeth  Deichmann  and 
her  sweet  mother.  I  hold  in  the  warmest  affection  Dr. 
Theodore  White,  my  companion  in  digging  at  the  Thomas 
Farm  in  Florida,  and  Henry  Seton,  who  has  gathered  some 
wonderful  material  for  us  in  the  fossil  fields  of  the  West. 
I  miss  Jim  Greenway,  now  in  the  Navy,  every  time  I  pass 


312  Naturalist  at  Large 

the  Bird  Room  door.  The  Entomological  Department  has 
lost  Philip  Darhngton  to  the  Army,  but  it  has  gained 
Vladimir  Nabokov,  a  poet  as  well  as  a  scientist.  We  need 
Philip  back  badly,  another  reason  for  wishing  that  the 
war  may  end  soon. 

I  must  pay  tribute  without  stint  to  the  wide  learning  of 
two  colleagues  who  are  as  good  botanists  as  they  are 
zoologists  —  Ludlow  Griscom  and  Joseph  Bequaert  —  orna- 
ments to  any  faculty.  The  Mollusk  Department  misses  John 
Higginson  Huntington,  my  nephew,  who  is  driving  an 
ambulance  in  North  Africa,  and  Tucker  Abbott,  who  came 
in  only  yesterday  for  a  last  farewell,  his  newly  won  wings 
proudly  displayed.  Richard  Winslow  Foster,  a  real  anchor 
to  windward,  a  good  scientist  and  a  generous  benefactor 
of  the  Museum  as  well,  is  still  with  us,  his  asthma  having 
kept  him  out  of  the  Army.  It  is  a  horrid  thing  to  say,  but 
I  am  glad,  because  after  all  we  have  got  to  take  care  of  the 
material  which  has  been  entrusted  to  our  charge  and  assume 
that  this  war  is  not  going  to  last  forever.  Henry  Drummond 
Russell,  formerly  associated  with  the  mollusks  here,  now 
helps  me  with  the  New  England  Museum  of  Natural  His- 
tory in  Boston. 

The  Department  sadly  misses  Harold  J.  Coolidge,  who 
long  ago  joined  the  Office  of  Strategic  Services. 

Russell  Olsen  has  acquired  great  technical  skill  not  only 
in  taking  fossils  from  the  matrix,  but  in  restoring  them  as 
well.  He  serves  the  Museum  with  unselfish  devotion  and 
has  a  good  eye  for  the  way  exhibits  ought  to  look. 

Ever  since  my  junior  year  in  college  Mr.  Eugene  N. 
Fischer  has  been  making  lovely  drawings  to  illustrate  the 
Museum  publications  and  he  is  doing  the  very  same  thing 


Render  unto  Caesar  313 

today.  Latterly  Mrs.  Myvanwy  Dick,  another  artist  of 
rare  skill,  has  volunteered  to  help  with  illustrations  when 
we  were  hard  pressed. 

If  anything  ever  happens  to  Maxwell  French  I  think  I'd 
resign  the  next  day.  He  does  more  different  odd  jobs  with 
less  waste  of  time  than  anyone  I  know.  He  can  tell  you  the 
cost  of  an  airmail  letter  to  South  Africa,  how  many  inches 
long  a  parcel  can  be  and  still  go  by  post,  and  he  can  pack 
the  most  delicate  specimens  so  that  they  will  reach  their 
destination  safely. 

Unfortunately  we  cannot  afford  a  full-time  Curator  of 
Fishes  at  the  present  writing,  but  William  Schroeder  of  the 
Woods  Hole  Oceanographic  Institution  helps  us  mightily. 

The  Reptile  Department  doesn't  seem  itself  without 
Benny  Shreve's  cheerful  countenance.  He  has  helped  us 
for  years,  meticulously  accurate,  in  determining  Neotropi- 
cal reptiles  and  amphibians,  which  are  his  special  pets. 

Elizabeth  Bangs  Bryant  has  for  years  cared  for  our 
enormous  collection  of  spiders  and  has  written  many  papers 
describing  new  species  of  this  usually  somewhat  neglected 
group. 

We  miss  Llewellyn  Price,  an  artist  with  a  keen  nose  for 
a  fossil,  and  a  delightful  companion.  At  present  he  is  on 
loan  to  the  Geological  Survey  of  Brazil. 

I  am  perfectly  sure  that  I  have  left  out  some  of  those 
whom  I  particularly  wanted  to  salute,  but  if  I  have  done 
so  it  has  been  unintentional.  To  me,  the  Museum  is  more 
like  a  person  than  a  thing,  an  object  of  affection  that 
comes  directly  next  to  my  nearest  and  dearest.  Here  we  all 
call  one  another  by  our  first  names.  There  is  no  Professor 
This  or  Curator  That  or  Director  So-and-so.  We  are  Bill 


314  Naturalist  at  Large 

and  Henry,  Liska,  Dick  and  Philip,  and  I  hope  that  this 
tradition  may  continue  forever.  It  wsis  not  always  so,  since 
my  predecessor  was  not  built  this  way.  He  felt  that  his 
resignation  would  inevitably  reveal  his  incompetence  (this, 
however,  is  not  worth  elaborating),  and  his  studied  un- 
kindness  to  me  during  the  last  years  of  his  life  was  a  bitter 
eye-opener  which  I  hardly  deserved.  I  hope  when  the  time 
comes  to  make  way  for  my  successor  that  I  may  step  out 
gracefully  and  help  him  take  over  one  of  the  greatest  and 
most  thrilling  tasks  which  a  man  can  assume.